Reckonings Contemporary Short Fiction by Native American Women

by Wong, Hertha D. Sweet; Muller, Lauren Stuart; Magdaleno, Jana Sequoya

• ISBN13: 9780195109252
• ISBN10: 0195109252
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-03-11
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

The fifteen Native women writers in Reckonings document transgenerational trauma, yet they also celebrate survival. Their stories are vital testaments of our times. Unlike most anthologies that present a single story from many writers, this volume offers a sampling of two to three stories by a select number of both famous and lesser known Native women writers in what is now the United States. Here you will find much-loved stories, many made easily accessible for the first time, and vibrant new stories by well-known contemporary Native American writers as well as fresh emergent voices. These stories share an understanding of Native women's lives in their various modes of loss and struggle, resistance and acceptance, and rage and compassion, ultimately highlighting the individual and collective will to endure against all odds. Reckonings features short stories by: Paula Gunn Allen, Kimberly M. Blaeser, Beth E. Brant, Anita Endrezze, Louise Erdrich, Diane Glancy, Reid Gomez, Janet Campbell Hale, Joy Harjo, Linda Hogan, Misha Nogha, Beth H. Piatote, Patricia Riley, Leslie Marmon Silko, and Anna Lee Walters.

Author Biography

Hertha D. Sweet Wong is Associate Professor of English at the University of California, Berkeley. She is the author of Sending My Heart Back Across the Years: Tradition and Innovation in Native American Autobiography; editor of Louise Erdrich's Love Medicine: A Casebook; and co-editor with John Elder of Family of Earth and Sky: Indigenous Tales of Nature from Around the World.
Jana Sequoya Magdaleno lives in Northern California where her focus is on Native community health and healing practices.
Lauren Stuart Muller teaches at City College of San Francisco, where she chairs the Interdisciplinary Studies Department. She is the editor of June Jordan's Poetry for the People: A Revolutionary Blueprint.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. xiii
Paula Gunn Allen (1939-)
Burned Alive in the Blues	p. 3
Deer Woman	p. 17
Beth E. Brant (1941-)
Turtle Gal	p. 27
Swimming Upstream	p. 38
Diane Glancy (1941-)
Minimal indian	p. 47
Stamp Dance	p. 54
An American Proverb	p. 59
Anna Lee Walters (1946-)
Buffalo Wallow Woman	p. 63
Las Vegas, New Mexico, July 1969	p. 75
Apparitions	p. 80
Janet Campbell Hale (1947-)
Claire	p. 87
Linda Hogan (1947-)
Descent	p. 113
Bush's Mourning Feast	p. 123
Leslie Marmon Silko (1948-)
Storyteller	p. 131
Mistaken Identity/Old Pancakes	p. 143
Patricia Riley (1950-)
Damping Down the Road	p. 153
Wisteria	p. 166
Joy Harjo (1951-)
The Reckoning	p. 175
The crow and the snake	p. 182
The Woman Who Fell from the Sky	p. 185
The Flood	p. 189
Letter from the End of the Twentieth Century	p. 192
Anita Endrezze (1952-)
Grandfather Sun Falls in Love with a Moon-Faced Woman	p. 197
The Humming of Stars and Bees and Waves	p. 204
Louise Erdrich (1954-)
Le Mooz	p. 213
Summer 1913/Miskomini-Geezis/Raspberry Sun	p. 222
Almost Soup/Lazy Stitch	p. 234
Kimberly M. Blaeser (1955-)
Like Some Old Story	p. 247
Growing Things	p. 252
Misha Nogha (1955-)
Memekwesiw	p. 259
Sakura	p. 263
Beth H. Piatote (1966-)
Beading Lesson	p. 267
Life-Size Indian	p. 270
Reid Gomez (1968-)
Electric gods	p. 281
Touch. Touch. Touching	p. 289
Author Biographies and Bibliographies	p. 293
Anthologies of Native American Literatures	p. 303
Index	p. 307
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