Off the Reservation: Reflections on Boundary-Busting Border-Crossing Loose Cannons

by Paula Gunn Allen

In this captivating collection of unpublished and published essays, one of our most important scholars, Paula Gunn Allen, explores the symbiotic relationship between Native American culture and the larger Western world. Through her own history and that of other Native peoples, she searches for a connection that will link the eco-spiritual and implicitly multicultural heritage to the demands of an increasingly global and culturally unilateral community.

Genres: History, Queer, Nonfiction, Indigenous, Native American

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

Paula Gunn Allen was a Native American poet, literary critic, lesbian activist, and novelist.

Born Paula Marie Francis in Albuquerque, Allen grew up in Cubero, New Mexico, a Spanish-Mexican land grant village bordering the Laguna Pueblo reservation. Of mixed Laguna, Sioux, Scottish, and Lebanese-American descent, Allen always identified most closely with the people among whom she spent her childhood and upbringing.

Having obtained a BA and MFA from the University of Oregon, Allen gained her PhD at the University of New Mexico, where she taught and where she began her research into various tribal religions.

Reviews

[Ellen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my favorite Paula Gunn Allen book. It is a collection of essays from the 70's to the 90's. Reading her makes your mind work differently! If you are weary of the bland white bread feminism coming out around the whole Clinton for president thing try Allen's deep complex take on rape culture/ the power of words/the power of women/spirituality/America's addiction to loneliness/ indigenous realities and being an American. She is funny and personal and smart as hell- these essays are so dense and yet so deeply satisfying you savor each one- like revolutionary fudge! I return to them again and again.

[Vanessa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Off the Reservation by Paula Gunn Allen. I was introduced to Paula Gunn Allen’s work while I was in community college by my English professor Stan Rushworth (whose books ill also be reviewing).

Instead of focusing on a sole topic, Paula Gunn Allen uniquely discusses various topics in regards to Native American culture and social issues. These topics vary from spirituality to rape culture to historical oppression.

There is a particular chapter that has stuck with me since I first read the book, “The Savages in the Mirror”. In this particular chapter she discusses America’s refusal to acknowledge its brutal treatment of Native Americans, both historical and present. She describes Americans as “world champion forgetters” and suffering from “cultural amnesia”.

This particular excerpt has stirred in my head for years and has contributed a significant amount to my intellectual thoughts:
“Certainly there is passion for memory loss in American thought...the real past is denied as though it is too painful— too opposed to the fantasy, the dream, to be spoken. I suppose if I saw myself as murdering, one way or another, several million people and hundreds of cultures, id long to forget my past, too.”

Since the first day I read that excerpt, everything has just *clicked*. The atrocities committed towards Native Americans is one of our countries greatest shameful events. It is too painful for America to acknowledge it. It is easier for America to continue the systemic oppression, land theft, land assault, and mass incarceration of Native people than to acknowledge its poor historical treatment towards them. It’s easier to sweep it under the rug than to apologize and help them heal.

[Jan Wellington · Rating 4 out of 5]

Note to Goodreads: the word is "Canons," not "Cannons"!

[Gail Johnson, Ph.D · Rating 4 out of 5]

After reading this book, I feel like I've just taken a literature course with an Native American twist.