This course will introduce students to 20th- and 21st-century American Indian literatures, in a variety of genres and media, and to relevant ways of understanding Indigenous self-representation in its historical, cultural, and political contexts. To help focus our study, we will read, view, and listen to texts produced primarily since the 1960s and maintain a loose focus on American Indian “performance” and American Indian engagements with “history.” As a bonus, one of the authors we will be reading, LeAnne Howe (Choctaw), will visit class in late January, and the UW School of Drama will produce a staged reading of her new play, Savage Conversations. UW Professor Christopher Teuton (Cherokee) will also visit class in early March to discuss his work with Cherokee storytellers to produce his book Cherokee Stories of the Turtle Island Liars' Club.
Required Texts are available at University Bookstore:
Allison Hedge Coke, Blood Run: Free Verse Play (Salt Publishing)
LeAnne Howe, Savage Conversations (Coffee House Press)
LeAnne Howe, Shell Shaker (Aunt Lute Books)
Layli Long Soldier, Whereas: Poems (Graywolf Press)
Christopher Teuton, Cherokee Stories of the Turtle Island Liars’ Club (U of North Carolina P)
Required short texts are available on the course Canvas site under "Files."