Instr:                 Sharee Paull
Office:              CRT 533,     229-5041
e-mail:              paul9456@uwm.edu
Office hours:     by appointment.

Course Information:          TR 2:05-3:20     PHY 120

Course Description

The postmodern period of the late Twentieth Century is often characterized as fragmentary, schizophrenic, solitary, and with regard to narrative and storytelling,  as unable to tell or write a communal story. At the end of the twentieth century, we have seemingly lost the ability to communicate and share experiences, and therefore, it is as if storytelling no longer has a necessary role in society.  Some say we are witnessing the decline of narrative, a decline that could lead to the deterioration of both the
communal experiences and ethical beliefs for the greater good.  We will discuss this process, but it is a loss which is increasingly blamed on technology and progressive history, which sought to isolate the worker from the family, the community and the land that supported them. Individualism and urbanization is gained at a cost, and this course's goal is to understand how the Native American Renaissance discusses, criticizes, and deals with the cost of this postmodern shift.  How does Native American literature represent and discuss this shift? While the western post-modern period seemingly celebrates abundance, status and wealth, the rate at which depression drugs are prescribed tells a different kind of story about our social condition.  Native American authors write a modern history that focuses on the roles of loss and isolation.  The history of ideas we will uncover in the fiction we read for this class will suggest perhaps that in spite of everything, Native Americans continue to have spiritual conviction in the power of language, of place and of the shared experience.

Texts:
Tracks. Louise Erdrich
The Jailing of Cecelia Capture. Janet Campbell Hale.
Ceremony. Leslie Marmon Silko.
Winter in the Blood. James Welch
And an anthology yet to be decided.