Mapping Out a Treacherous Terrain: Working at the Crossroads of Autobiographical Studies and Inter-American Literary Studies

  • Author(s) / Creator(s)
  • What does it mean to do autobiographical studies within the realm of Inter-American studies? What does it mean to study the story of a self within the context of such a huge terrain—geographic, cultural, linguistic, ethnic? In this chapter I look briefly at two Indigenous bilingual texts from Canada, using both Cree narrative theory and testimonial theories to show how different perspectives change our understanding of those life narratives and to underscore our responsibilities as scholars to read the texts within “the living web of the people and tradition from which they both arose” (Gunn Allen xi). The texts chosen are bilingual texts, life narratives of Cree women, printed in Cree and English. I argue that a recognition of literary and rhetorical sovereignty means that we do not impose critical terms from other cultural traditions in our readings of Indigenous texts. ¿Qué significa trabajar en la disciplina de los estudios autobiográficos dentro de la disciplina de los estudios interamericanos? ¿Qué significa estudiar la historia de un ser dentro de un terreno (geográfico, cultural, lingüístico, étnico) tan enorme? En este capítulo, yo examino dos textos indígenas bilingües del Canadá, empleando ambos la teoría narrativa Cree y las teorías de testimonio para mostrar que los acercamientos teóricos diferentes a las narrativas de vida resultan en lecturas diferentes de los textos y para subrayar que nuestras responsabilidades como académicos nos exigen que leamos los textos dentro de “la telaraña viva del pueblo y de la tradición de la cual surgen” (Gunn Allen xi). Los textos son bilingües, narrativas de vida de mujeres Cree, publicada en Cree y inglés. Afirmo que un reconocimento de la soberanía retórica y literaria significa que no imponemos términos críticos de otras tradiciones culturales en nuestras lecturas de los textos indígenas.

  • Date created
    2016-08-05
  • Subjects / Keywords
  • Type of Item
    Chapter
  • DOI
    https://doi.org/10.7939/R3JD4Q45C
  • License
    © 2016 L. J. Beard. This version of this article is open access and can be downloaded and shared. The original author(s) and source must be cited.
  • Language
  • Source
    This is an Accepted Manuscript of a book chapter published by Routledge in Auto/Biography across the Americas: Transnational Themes in Life Writing on 2017, available online: https://www.routledge.com/Auto-Biography-across-the-Americas-Transnational-Themes-in-Life-Writing/Chansky/p/book/9781138959972.