AMST 286 - Indigenous Women’s Decolonial Narratives

Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)

(Same as ENGL 286 and WMST 286) In their article “Decolonization is Not a Metaphor,” Aleut scholar Eve Tuck and Ethnic Studies scholar K. Wayne Yang warn that “the metaphorization of decolonization makes possible a set of evasions, or settler moves to innocence, that problematically attempt to reconcile settler guilt and complicity, and rescue settler futurity.” As an approach to wrestle with this warning, our class examines the ways in which Indigenous women (from primarily Native North American nations) imagine and safeguard Indigenous futures in light of settler colonial efforts to deny and erase indians. How do Indigenous women imagine anti- and decolonial narratives toward critical sovereignty and autonomous resistance? How does the creative labor of Indigenous women – through prose and poetry, art, and film – destabilize the persistent colonial formations that are gendered, racialized, and genocidal. Indigenous women artists, scholars, theorists, and activists provide our course with its materials, and include: Louise Erdrich, Layli Longsoldier, Marcie Rendon, Debra Barker, Eve Tuck, Renya Ramirez, Dian Million, Mishuana Goeman, Shan Goshorn, Sarah Sense, Hulleah Tsinhnahjinnie, Annie Pootoogoook, Shelley Niro, Arigon Starr, Matika Wilbur, Bethany Yellowtail, and others. Molly McGlennen.

Two 75-minute periods.