Cross-Cultural and Tribally-Centered Politics: An Overview and a Response to the Current Split in American Indian Literary Studies

Abstract

Currently, American Indian studies seem divided between “cross-cultural” and “tribally-centered” critical positions. Scholars like Arnold Krupat and the late Louis Owens represent the established cross-cultural school of criticism in American Indian studies: they emphasize the cultural and political power of American Indian literary “hybridity” to subvert structures of colonial domination and to communicate cultural differences. The more recent and growing tribally-centered school of criticism, represented by scholars like Elizabeth Cook-Lynn and Craig Womack, however, criticize established “cross-cultural” approaches to American Indian writing. The latter critics study the tradition of Native writing in relation to ongoing tribal struggles for political autonomy, and emphasize political and literary principles of tribal nationalism. The article outlines developments in these critical positions and studies major arguments behind them. Its concluding suggestion is that rather than creating (essentialist) divisions in the field, the evolving tribally-centered criticism is introducing valid and much needed new directions for the development of American Indian scholarship.