OU PROFESSORS CO-AUTHOR BOOK ON NATIVE AMERICAN SOVEREIGNTY

NORMAN – In American Indian Literary Nationalism, two University of Oklahoma professors explore a national approach to Native American literature and argue that such a method is not only justifiable, but also crucial to supporting Native sovereignty and self-determination.

Robert Warrior (Osage), professor of Native American Studies and English, and Craig Womack (Muskogee Creek-Cherokee), professor of English, co-authored the recently published book with Jace Weaver (Cherokee), professor of religion and director of the Institute of Native American Studies at the University of Georgia.

Warrior, Weaver and Womack do not believe that this is the only approach to Native literature. They make a point to allow for divergent viewpoints that support a Native literary nationalism, as long as differing approaches endorse free expression and both Native and non-Native participation.

Simon Ortiz, who wrote the foreword for this book, laid the foundation for the study of American Indian literature in 1981 with his essay, “Toward a National Indian Literature.” Twenty-five years later, the “who” and “how” of American Indian literature are still being discussed. In addition, how the literature of Native America is linked to its communities has gained importance. American Indian Literary Nationalism seeks to address these questions.

Warrior is author of Tribal Secrets: Recovering American Indian Intellectual Traditions and co-author, with Paul Chaat Smith, of Like a Hurricane: The Indian Movement from Alcatraz to Wounded Knee.

Weaver is the author or editor of nine books and won the Wordcraft Award for Best Creative Non-Fiction from the Wordcraft Circle of Native American Writers for his book Other Words. As a practicing lawyer, he has consulted for the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Justice Department on depictions of Native Americans in public institutions.

Womack is the author of Drowning in Fire and Red on Red: Native American Literary Separatism. He won the Wordcraft Circle’s Writer of the Year award in 2002.

American Indian Literary Nationalism is available at bookstores or from the University of New Mexico Press. For additional information or to place an order, call (800) 249-7737 or visit www.unmpress.com.