| The survival of Native American identity is the central theme of this dissertation. While I approach this subject from a broadly literary perspective, I also consider spiritual, philosophical, historical, and cultural aspects. While consulting a wide range of writers, scholars, and critics who are interested in exploring and preserving Native American culture, I narrow the subject of survival by focusing on the survival of communal and individual Native American identity in the face of identity-stripping forces.;My observations on the survival of Native American identity are concerned mainly with the works of Native American writers Sherman Alexie, Louise Erdrich, Leslie Marmon Silko, and Linda Hogan. Each of these four authors makes a distinct and vital contribution to Native American culture and discourse. Across all four chapters I observe the varying survival strategies that Alexie, Erdrich, Silko, and Hogan suggest Native Americans employ in order to preserve and maintain their cultural and individual identities. In addition, I explore what Native American identity is and why it is important that it survive. I also examine some of the narrative strategies these four authors believe will enable, or facilitate, Native American survival.;One commonality among all four writers is the belief that storytelling is the primary way, perhaps the only way, to preserve and maintain Native American identity and thus cultural survival. Though I do look into what each author means by "storytelling," it remains an abstract concept, one open to interpretation, subject to change, and elusive even to the authors themselves.;Despite their irreducibility and changeability, vital Native American stories, my dissertation finally argues (in agreement with Alexie, Erdrich, Silko, and Hogan), are of such import that the very survival of Native American identity depends upon them. |
