Great Plains Studies, Center for
Date of this Version
2006
Document Type
Article
Abstract
That a critical vocabulary has been established for addressing Louise Erdrich's body of work is quite evident in Approaches to Teaching Louise Erdrich. Key words in the Erdrich lexicon- syncretic, hybridize, amalgamate, mediate, integrate, dialogic, accretive, connective, merging, blurring, webbed, multivoiced, transformative- echo throughout the collection and stamp the text's theoretical approach to her oeuvre. There are two common pedagogical themes that dominate the essays. Teachers elaborate on ways to help students understand the challenges to hegemonic views of culture, history, gender, and religion that Erdrich, drawing upon an imagination nourished by her ethnic and cultural identity as a contemporary American woman of Native and German descent, weaves through her poetry, autobiography, and fiction. Many of the essays also discuss ways to foreground Erdrich's innovative approach to narration in the classroom.
Comments
Published in GREAT PLAINS QUARTERLY 26:3 (Summer 2006). Copyright © 2006 Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska–Lincoln.