Re-Mapping the Trauma Paradigm: The Politics of Native American Grief in Louise Erdrich’s “Shamengwa”

Abstract

Martinez-Falquina offers a much-needed re-mapping of the trauma paradigm in relation to Native American literary studies. Starting from an analysis of Louise Erdrich’s 2002 short story “Shamengwa,” the chapter theorizes Native American grief—with a focus on American Indian Historical Trauma—attending to its fundamental political implications. The relevance of its conclusions—the need to understand suffering and healing as both individual and communal processes; the vindication of an idiosyncratic understanding of place and time; the affirmation of post-traumatic growth in spite of loss; and the combination of differential culture-specific elements with an attention to hybridity—contribute to the dismantling of monolithic views of Native American cultures and to the revision of Western forms of knowledge.