Native American Literature

Course Number:

ENG 240

Transcript Title:

Native American Literature

Created:

Aug 10, 2022

Updated:

Jul 11, 2023

Total Credits:

4

Lecture Hours:

40

Lecture / Lab Hours:

0

Lab Hours:

0

Satisfies Cultural Literacy requirement:

Yes

Satisfies General Education requirement:

Yes

Grading Options

A-F, P/NP, Audit

Default Grading Options

A-F

Repeats available for credit:

0

Alignment with Institutional Learning Outcomes

Major

1. Communicate effectively using appropriate reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills. (Communication)

Major

2. Creatively solve problems by using relevant methods of research, personal reflection, reasoning, and evaluation of information. (Critical thinking and Problem-Solving)

Not Addressed

3. Extract, interpret, evaluate, communicate, and apply quantitative information and methods to solve problems, evaluate claims, and support decisions in their academic, professional and private lives. (Quantitative Literacy)

Major

4. Use an understanding of cultural differences to constructively address issues that arise in the workplace and community. (Cultural Awareness)

Major

5. Recognize the consequences of human activity upon our social and natural world. (Community and Environmental Responsibility)

To establish an intentional learning environment, Institutional Learning Outcomes (ILOs) require a clear definition of instructional strategies, evidence of recurrent instruction, and employment of several assessment modes.

Major Designation

1. The outcome is addressed recurrently in the curriculum, regularly enough to establish a thorough understanding.
2. Students can demonstrate and are assessed on a thorough understanding of the outcome.
   • The course includes at least one assignment that can be assessed by applying the appropriate CLO rubric.

Minor Designation

1. The outcome is addressed adequately in the curriculum, establishing fundamental understanding.
2. Students can demonstrate and are assessed on a fundamental understanding of the outcome.
   • The course includes at least one assignment that can be assessed by applying the appropriate CLO rubric.

Suggested Outcome Assessment Strategies

Self-assessed discussion forums, mini-essays, and one final project (essay, video, digital story).

Course Activities and Design

The determination of teaching strategies used in the delivery of outcomes is generally left to the discretion of the instructor. Here are some strategies that you might consider when designing your course: lecture, small group/forum discussion, flipped classroom, dyads, oral presentation, role play, simulation scenarios, group projects, service learning projects, hands-on lab, peer review/workshops, cooperative learning (jigsaw, fishbowl), inquiry based instruction, differentiated instruction (learning centers), graphic organizers, etc.

Course Content

Outcome #1: Analyze the importance of self-documentation in Native American literature as a means to challenge stereotypes and caricatures.

• History of discrimination against Indigenous Americans in the US
  • Political motivations
  • Stereotypes & caricatures (i.e. mascots, representation in popular culture)
  • Institutional discrimination (i.e. forced removal and westward expansion, boarding schools, and forced assimilation)
  • Individual discrimination (i.e. prejudicial beliefs, words, behaviors)
  • Violence against Indigenous women
  • Fetishization of Indigenous culture
• Interrelated themes and motifs in Native American literature
  • Themes
    • Racial and Cultural Identity
    • Cultural and Family Fragmentation
    • Sovereignty and Self-Determination
  • Motifs
    • Sacredness and Animacy of Land
    • Trickster
    • World Creation
    • Language and Cultural Reclamation

Outcome #2: Explain how various perceptions of identity shape Native American literature and scholarship.

• Explore through careful analysis (written, verbal, and/or creative) how Native American literature reflects diverse Indigenous cultures. 
• Familiarize students with analytical techniques of selected literature through the lenses of historical and cultural scholarship
  • Close reading of language, structure, themes, symbols, and other textual features.
  • Analysis of texts from the perspective of their socio-economic contexts.

• Interpret academic assessments of Native American literature, with the goal of critiquing or expanding the arguments of this scholarship. 

Outcome #3: Examine the intersection of class, history, politics, gender, and sexuality in Native American literature and apply that knowledge to real-world issues impacting contemporary populations. 

• The Native American experience through social, historical, and cultural contexts.
• How historical and political events impact Native American communities and literature.
• How historical, social, and political issues are reflected in contemporary Native American literature
• How Native American literature reflects the ongoing activism and cultural flourishing of contemporary communities.

Outcome #4: Identify and trace the distinctive literary forms--including oral traditions, novels, plays, poems, film, and manifestos–and/or recurring themes of Native American literature from historical through contemporary texts.

• Define a variety of literary forms and provide examples of these forms using the study of model texts.
• How literary forms relate to historical and cultural moments in Native American literature.
• Interpreting how authors’ variations of various forms relate to theme, motif, and purpose.

Outcome #5: Analyze a text through close critical reading and offer interpretation orally, digitally, and/or in writing, using and citing textual evidence in support of a thesis.

• Guide students’ practice of close reading to accomplish interpretative goals including understanding a work’s key ideas, identifying how a work’s craft and structure reinforce its themes and recognizing how work connects to others.
• “Tracking” methods to help students achieve a rich understanding of the texts.
  • Annotation of texts with marginal notes or comments.
  • Graphic organizers to track themes and textual features and to organize student responses to the texts.
  • Digital tools (i.e. blog posts, portfolio entries, discussion posts, video “reels” or “stories”) for tracking passages or textual features in works.

• Introduce students to the OWL Purdue Online Writing Lab as a resource to help them with all aspects of essay writing including thesis and content generation, citation, organization, and proper formatting: https://owl.english.purdue.edu. 

Suggested Texts and Materials

Anthologies

• Coyote Was Going There: Indian Literature of the Oregon Country (1980).  Ed. Jarold Ramsey.
• The Remembered Earth: An Anthology of Contemporary Native American Literature (1981).  Ed. Geary Hobson.
• A Gathering of Spirit: A Collection by North American Indian Women (1984).  Ed. Beth Brant.
• American Indian Myths and Legends (1985).  Ed. Richard Erdoes and Alfonso Ortiz.
• Harper's Anthology of 20th Century Native American Poetry (1988).  Ed. Duane Niatum.
• Native American Literature: A Brief Introduction and Anthology (1997).  Ed. Gerald Vizenor.
• Native American Testimony (1999). Ed. Peter Nabokov.
• Nothing But the Truth (2001).  Ed. John L. Purdy and James Ruppert.
• I Tell You Now: Autobiographical Essays by Native American Writers (2005).  Ed. Brian Swann and Arnold Krupat.
• Reckonings: Contemporary Short Fiction by Native American Women (2008).   Ed. Hertha D. Sweet Wong.
• Walking the Clouds: An Anthology of Indigenous Science Fiction (2012).  Ed. Grace Dillon.
• Cherokee Stories of the Turtle Island Liars Club (2012).  Ed. Chris Teuton.
• New Poets of Native Nations (2018). Ed. Heid Erdrich.
• Love Beyond Body, Space, and Time: An Indigenous LGBT Sci-Fi Anthology (2016),  Eds. Hope Nicholson, S.M. Beiko, Erin Cossar
• After the End: An Anthology of Two-Spirit and Indigiqueer Speculative Fiction (2020), Ed. Joshua Whitehead

Works by Individual Authors

• Samuel Occom. “Sermon Preached on the Death of Moses Paul, an Indian” (1772)
• William Apess.  “Eulogy on King Philip” (1836); On Our Ground, the Complete Writings of William Apess (1992)
• Jane Johnston Schoolcraft.  The Sound the Stars Make Rushing through the Night Sky: The Writings of Jane Johnston Schoolcraft. Ed. Robert Dale Parker (2007)
• John Rollin Ridge (Yellow Bird).  The Adventures of Joaquin Murieta, the Celebrated California Bandit (1854); Poems (1867)
• Sarah Winnemucca.  Life Among the Paiutes (1883)
• John Milton Oskison.  “The Problem of Old Harjo” (1907)
• E. Pauline Johnson.  Legends of Vancouver (1911); The Moccasin Maker (1913)
• Zitkala-Sa (Gertrude Simmons Bonnin).  American Indian Stories (1921)
• Mourning Dove (Chrystal Quintasket / Humishuma). Cogewea (1927); Coyote Stories (1933)
• D'Arcy McNickle.  The Surrounded (1936); Wind from an Enemy Sky (1978)
• N. Scott Momaday.  House Made of Dawn (1968); The Way to Rainy Mountain (1969); The Names (1976); The Man Made of Words  (1997)
• James Welch.  Riding the Earthboy 40 (1971); Winter in the Blood (1974); Fools Crow (1986); The Heartsong of Charging Elk (2000)
• Leslie Marmon Silko.  Ceremony (1977); Storyteller (1981); Almanac of the Dead (1991); Gardens in the Dunes (2000), The Sentence (2020)
• Simon Ortiz.  From Sand Creek (1981); Woven Stone (1991)
• Joy Harjo.  She Had Some Horses (1983); The Woman Who Fell From the Sky (1994); How We Became Human: New and Selected Poems, 1975-2001 (2004).
• Louise Erdrich.  Love Medicine (1984); Tracks (1988); The Bingo Palace (1994); A Plague of Doves (2008); The Round House (2012); La Rose (2015)
• Robert Conley.  The Witch of Goingsnake and Other Stories (1988); Cherokee Thoughts, Honest and Uncensored (2008)
• Linda Hogan.  Mean Spirit (1990); Dwellings: A Spiritual History of the Living World (1995); Power (1998); The Woman Who Watches Over the World: A Native Memoir (2001)
• Gerald Vizenor.  Griever: An American Monkey King in China (1986). Bearheart: The Heirship Chronicles (1990)
• Ray Young Bear.  The Invisible Musician (1990); Black Eagle Child: The Facepaint Narratives (1992)
• Thomas King.  Medicine River (1990); Green Grass, Running Water (1993); The Truth About Stories (2005); The Inconvenient Indian (2012)
• Sherman Alexie.  The Business of Fancydancing (1992)  The Toughest Indian in the World. (2000)
• Carter Revard.  An Eagle Nation (1993); Family Matters, Tribal Affairs (1998); How the Songs Came Down (2005)
• Wendy Rose.  Going to War with All My Relations: New and Selected Poems (1993)
• Susan Power.  The Grass Dancer (1994)
• Janice Gould.  Earthquake Weather (1996)
• Adrian C. Louis.  Ancient Acid Flashes Back (2000); Bone & Juice (2001)
• Eden Robinson.  Monkey Beach (2000); “Terminal Avenue” (2004, published in So Long Been Dreaming, ed. Nalo Hopkinson)
• Stephen Graham Jones.  The Fast Red Road (2002); The Bird is Gone:  A Manifesto (2003); Ledfeather (2008); Bleed into Me (2012); “Letter to a Just-Starting-Out Indian Writer, and Maybe to Myself” (2015), Only the Good Indians (2020)
• Richard Van Camp.  The Lesser Blessed (2004)
• William Sanders.  Are We Having Fun Yet?: American Indian Fantasy Stories (2005)
• Eric Gansworth.  Mending Skins (2005)
• LeAnne Howe.  Miko Kings (2007)
• Toni Jensen.  From the Hilltop (2010).
• Blake M. Hausman.  Riding the Trail of Tears (2011)
• Janet McAdams.  Red Weather (2012)
• Daniel H. Wilson.  Robopocalypse (2012)
• Natalie Diaz.  When My Brother Was an Aztec (2012) Postcolonial Love Poem (2020)
• Deborah Miranda.  Bad Indians: A Tribal Memoir (2013)
• Robin W. Kimmerer.  Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants (2013)
• Elissa Washuta.  My Body Is a Book of Rules (2014)
• Erika Wurth.  Crazy Horse’s Girlfried (2014); Buckskin Cocaine (2017)
• Drew Hayden Taylor.  Take Us to Your Chief (2016)
• Layli Long Soldier.  Whereas (2017)
• Cherie Dimaline.  The Marrow Thieves (2017)
• Tommy Pico. Nature Poem (2017)
• Rebecca Roanhorse.  Trail of Lightning (2018) and “Welcome to Your Authentic Indian ExperienceTM” (2017)
• Terese Mailhot.  Heart Berries (2018)
• Tommy Orange.  There There (2018)
• Brandon Hobson.  Where the Dead Sit Talking (2018)
• Sean Teuton, Native American Literature: A Very Short Introduction (2018)