NATIVE AMERICAN STUDIES

AND

WOMEN STUDIES DEPARTMENTS

NATIVE AMERICAN WOMEN

Course Level: 300-500

Anne Waters, J.D., Ph.D.

Phone: (505) 265-3912

Course Description. This course will study works of Indigenous North American Women through an examination of native and nonnative historical and contemporary oratory, argument, letters, addresses, and texts. From the influence of precolonial indigenous culture on Native women’s lives, through colonization via slavery, force of weaponry, policies of removal, allotment and disease, to such turn of the century works of Laura Cornelius Kellogg and Gertrude Simmons Bonnin, and contemporary writings of Alice Kehoe, Winona Laduke, Annette Jaimes, Wilma Mankiller, Clara Sue Kidwell, Laura Whitt, and Marilou Awiakta, we will explore the interplay of Native women’s voices. We will learn how Native women have influenced American women’s lives, and how certain philosophical concepts like gender, race, class, nation, genocide, indigenism, and progress, have impacted Native women’s lives. Traditional and contemporary North American Indigenist Women’s values will be examined in contexts of survival, ecology, law, reproduction, and education.

Course Requirements. Attendance will be presumed. A journal of informal comments on each reading topic (eg., removal, education, etc.) will be kept to be collected at the end of the term. All students are expected to arrive at class prepared to discuss the assigned materials. Questions will be provided for a midterm exam of no more than 10 double spaced typed pages (6 pages if taking course at 300 level). A formal research paper, on an APPROVED topic selected from a list (on reserve at the library), will be due the second half of the semester--minimal 10 pages for undergraduates, and 20 pages for graduate students. Precis papers may also occasionally be required of graduate students.

Grading. A 100 point scale. Attendance = 15; Journal = 10; Midterm = 25; Research Paper 50%. All assignments must be completed to receive a passing grade. No incompletes without prior written approval.

Required Texts.

Native American Testimony: A chronicle of Indian-White Relations from Prophecy to the Present, 1492 - 1992, Peter Nabokov, ed. Penguin: New York. 1991.

Women and Power in Native North America, Laura F. Klein and Lillian A. Ackerman, eds. University of Oklahoma Press: Norman. 1995

Negotiators of Change: Historical Perspectives on Native American Women, Nancy Shoemaker, ed. Routledge: New York. 1995.

Recommended Texts.

Messengers of the Wind: Native American Women Tell Their Life Stories, Jane Katz, ed. Ballantine: New York. 1995.

Selu: Seeking the Corn-Mother’s Wisdom, Marilou Awiakta (Cherokee). Fulcrum Pub.” Golden, Co. 1993.

On Reserve in the Library.*

Ecocide of Native America: Environmental Destruction of Indian Lands and Peoples, Donald A. Grinde & Bruce E Johansen, eds. Clear Light: Santa Fe. 1995.

Annette Jaimes, The State of Native America

Tribal Secrets: Recovering American Indian Intellectual Traditions. Robert Allen Warrior, ed. University of Minnesota Press: Minneapolis. 1995.

Readings in American Indian Women’s Text (unpublished collection of published articles), Anne Waters.

Words of Today’s American Indian Women: Ohoyo Makachi. Ohoyo Research Center: Wichita Falls. 1991.

SCHEDULE OF TOPICS AND READING.

WEEKS 1-3: NATIVE WOMEN CREATE HISTORIC TESTIMONY

A. Cultural Difference--ENCOUNTERS, DISPOSSESSION

Reading Nabokov I: The Buffalo Go, Old Lady Horse (Kiowa), 174; No Dawn To The East (Anonymous), 181; Gone Forever, Buffalo Bird Woman (Hidatsa) 182; This Awful Loneliness (Anonymous), 184; The Way Agents Get Rich, Sarah Winnemucca (Paiute), 198; Annie Makes Her Choice, Annie Lowry (Paiute), 204; He-na Tom, the Hoodwinker, Lucy Thompson (Yurok), 251.

B. Cultural Struggle--RESERVATIONS, RESURGENCE

Reading Nabokov II: Life On the Checkerboard, Ruth Muskrat Bronson (Cherokee), 262; The Hopi Push of War, Helen Sekaquaptewa (Hopi), 271; The Best and the Brightest, Society of American Indians, 282; Scandal in Oklahoma, Gertrude Bonnin (Zitkala-sa) (Sioux et. al.) . Reducing Navajo Sheep, The Blind Man’s Daughter (Navajo)330; On Relocation, Bennie Bearskin (Winnebago) [w/Watt Spade, Cherokee], 348; The New Indian Wars, Laura McCloud (Tulalip) 362; Dark Sky Over Black Mesa, Asa Bazhonoodah (Navajo) 397; Indian Children in Crisis, (Anonymous, Hopi girl of 13) 403; Restoring Life to the Dead, Rosemary Cambra (Muwekma), 424.

HANDOUTS: *“The Indian in Wartime,” by Ella Deloria (Sioux) 1944; *A Winnebago Father’s Instructions to His Son, (1923); *A Pawnee Mother’s Advice to Her Son, Lone Chief.

C. *“Our Democracy and the American Indian,” Laura Cornelius Kellogg (Wynnogene)

WEEKS 4 - 6: NATIVE WOMEN, GENDER, and FEMINISM in THE 80’s

The Following Articles are in the Ohoyo Makachi Text.

“Past Positives and Present Problems,” Shirley Hill Witt (Akwesasne Mohawk) 11.

“Squaw Image Stereotyping,” Nancy Butterfield (Red Lake Chippewa) 20.

“Racism-Sexism Characteristics,” Ramona T. Sandoval (Winnebago/Sac & Fox) 114.

“Indian Women and Textbook Omission,” Rayna Green (Cherokee) 117.

“Changing Times and Changing Roles of Alaska Native Women,” Rosita Worl (Tlingit) 134.

“Steps Toward Native Leadership,” Shirley Hill Witt (Akwesasne Mohawk) 139.

“Indian Women as Change Agents for Indian Policy,” Ethel Krepps (Kiowa/Miami) 146.

“Historical Perspectives: The Dakota Woman,” Yvonne June Wynde (Sisseton-Wahpeton Dakota) 151.

“Indian Women Challenge the ‘80’s,” Lenore Sweet (Winnebago) 156.

“Indian Women and Feminism,” Leslie Wolfe, 160.

“Retrospect and Prospect: The Past, Present and Future of Indian Women,” Helen M. Scheirbeck (Lumbee) 171.

MIDTERM EXAM DUE : _________________

WEEKS 7 - 9: NATIVE WOMEN AS NEGOTIATORS WITH POWER

Week 7:

*Winona Laduke, “They always come back” (An Interview)..in Gathering of Spirit: Writing and Art by North American Indian Women, Beth Brant (Degonwadonti) ed. Sinister Wisdom: Rockland. 1984.

*Robert A. Williams, Jr. Gendered Checks and Balances. 24 Georgia Law Review

1019.

*Ward Churchill. Nobody’s Pet Poodle: Jimmie Durham, An Artist for Native North America. From A Native Son: Selected Essays on Indigenism, 1985-1995. Boston: South End Press. 1996; 483.

972; 263.

Week 8:

Readings below are from our Text, Women and Power in Native North America, Edited by Laura F. Klein and Lillian A. Ackerman. Norman: Univ. of Oklahoma Press, 1995.

Introduction; Gender In Inuit Society (Lee Guemple); Mother as Clanswoman: Rank and Gender in Tlingit Society (Laura F. Klein); Asymmetric Equals: Women and Men Among the Chipewyan (Henry Sharp); Complementary But Equal: Gender Status in the Plateau (Lillian A. Ackerman); First Among Equals? The Changing Status of Seneca Women (Joy Bilharz); Blackfoot Persons (Alice B. Kehoe).

Week 9:

Evolving Gender Roles In Pomo Society (Victoria D. Patterson); The Dynamics of Southern Paiute Women’s Roles (Martha C. Knack); The Gender Status of Navajo Women (Mary Shepardson); Continuity and Change in Gender Roles at San Juan Pueblo (Sue-Ellen Jacobs); Women’s Status Among the Muskogee and Cherokee (Richard A. Sattler); Gender and Power In Native North America (Daniel Maltz and JoAllyn Archambault).

WEEKS 10 - 12: WOMEN, GENOCIDE, SOVEREIGN NATIONS, INDIGENISM

WeekS 10-12:

*John Borrows. “Frozen Rights in Canada: Constitutional Interpretation and the Trickster.” 22 Am. Indian L. Rev. 37 (1997). Norman: Univ. of Oklahoma College of Law.

*Michael Grant. “Seminole Tribe v. Florida--Extinction of the “New Buffalo?”. 22 Am. Indian L. Rev. 171 (1997). Norman: Univ. of Oklahoma College of Law.

*Ward Churchill. Defining the Unthinkable: Towards a Viable Understanding of Genocide. A Little Matter of Genocide: Holocaust and Denial in the Americas, 1492 to the Present. San Francisco: City Lights Books. 1997; 399.

*Ward Churchill. I Am Indigenist: Notes on the Ideology of the Fourth World. From A Native Son: Selected Essays on Indigenism, 1985-1995. Boston: South End Press. 1996; 509.

*Jewell Praying Wolf James (“Se-Sealth”). Testimony: Ecocide and Genocide. Ecocide of Native America: Environmental Destruction of Indian Lands and Peoples. Edited by Donald A Grinde and Bruce E. Johansen. Santa Fe: Clear Light Publishers. 1995; 246.

*Whitt, Laurie Anne. “Indigenous Peoples and the Cultural Politics of Knowledge,” Issues in Native American Cultural Identity. Edited by Michael K. Green. New York: Peter Lang, 1995, 223-272.

*Whitt, Laurie Anne. “Biocolonialism and the Commodification of Knowledge,” Science as Culture, Volume 7, Number 1, 1998.

WEEKS 13-16. Articles from Annette Jaimes text, upcoming issue Hypatia: Native American Women, and student semester project presentations.