As a Saginaw Chippewa descendant (ajijaak/crane clan), this holiday holds complexity for me…
I have fond memories of seeing family and loved ones, while also holding the knowledge that my ancestors were forced to attend both the Carlisle and Mount Pleasant Boarding schools. Here they were stripped of their Ojibwemowin, forced to speak English, and abandon their cultural teachings. Native children were taken from their families all across Turtle Island and put into these boarding schools, also known as residential schools, where millions of children died. The Thanksgiving holiday recalls the horrors of colonial genocide for Indigenous peoples as it reminds us of the violent colonial contact between settlers and Native peoples.
This list attempts to honor the stories told by Indigenous peoples, and to honor the stories of Indigenous resistance and reclamation in the face of ongoing colonial violence globally. I encourage you to read some of these selections over the holiday, taking the time to consider your own positionality in this colonial settler-state called America.
-ANNABEL YOUNG, GIRLS WRITE NOW FELLOW
The Sentence
by Louise Erdrich
HarperCollins
Ceremony
by Leslie Marmon Silko
Penguin Random House
How We Became Human
by Joy Harjo
W.W. Norton
Braiding Sweetgrass
by Robin Wall Kimmerer
Milkweed Editions
Decolonizing Methodologies
By Linda Tuhiwai Smith
Bloomsbury
Firekeeper’s Daughter
By Angeline Boulley
Macmillan
Where We Once Belonged
by Sia Figiel
Kaya Press
Hearts Unbroken
by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Penguin Random House
Written by the Body: Gender Expansiveness and Indigenous Non-Cis Masculinities
by Lisa Tatonetti
University of Minnesota Press
Too Much Lip
by Lisa Tatonetti
HarperCollins
When My Brother Was an Aztec
by Natalie Diaz
Copper Canyon Press
The Things She’s Seen
by Ambelin Kwaymullina and Ezekial Kwaymullina
Penguin Random House
Probably Ruby
by Lisa Bird-Wilson
Penguin Random House
Bad Cree
by Jessica Johns
Penguin Random House
New Poets of Native Nations
Edited by Heid E. Erdrich
Gray Wolf Press
A Two-Spirt Journey: The Autobiography of a Lesbian Ojibwa-Cree Elder
by Ma-Nee Chacaby
University of Manitoba Press
The Scalpel and the Silver Bear
by Lori Arviso Alvord and Elizabeth Cohen Van Pelt
Birchbark Books
Woman of Light
by Kali Fajardo-Anstine
Penguin Random House
The Round House
by Louise Erdrich
HarperCollins
Poukahangatus
by Tayi Tibble
Penguin Random House
Dog Flowers
by Danielle Geller
Penguin Random House
Holding Our World Together: Ojibwe Women and the Survival of the Community
by Brenda J. Child
Penguin Random House
Almanac of the Dead
by Leslie Marmon Silko
Penguin Random House
Carry
by Toni Jensen
Penguin Random House
Notable Native People
by Adrienne Keene
Penguin Random House
Surviving the City
by Tasha Spillett
Birchbark Books
American Indian Stories
by Zitkála-Šá
Penguin Random House
Boarding School Seasons
by Brenda J. Child
University of Nebraska Press
Imaginary Borders
by Xiuhtezcatl Martinez
Penguin Random House
This is Paradise
by Kristiana Kahakauwila
Penguin Random House
How to Lose Everything
by Christa Couture
Birchbark Books
The Grass Dancer
by Susan Power
Penguin Random House
The Bone People
by Keri Hulme
Penguin Random House
Split Tooth
by Tanya Tagaq
Birchbark Books
Annabel Young
Annabel Young (she/her) is a writer, poet, and creative who is passionate about decolonization work. She is Ojibwe by way of Brooklyn (Saginaw Chippewa descendent, ajijaak/crane clan). Annabel holds a B.A. in English and American Studies, with minors in Indigenous Studies and Inequality Studies. She comes to Girls Write Now after acting as both Managing and Layout Editor of Cornell’s oldest literary magazine, Rainy Day, and writing for Cornell’s yearbook. During her undergraduate years, Annabel helped to bring Jamie Black’s REDress project to Cornell to bring awareness to MMIWG2S on campus. In her free time, Annabel can be found writing short stories and poems that focus on themes of family, colliding worldviews, and the daily life of a twenty-something.