I've invented two tribes.

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

I am writing the first book of a five or six book series that are tied together by members of an American Indian nation. Only one book will focus on a tribal member who actually lives on the 'rez' while the other books have characters who live in urban centers.

There are a few reasons why I am doing this.

First, I can invent a language, ceremonies, and inner conflicts; using an existing tribe and its language, ceremonies, and inner conflicts mean that I am exposing the traditional values of that community to outsiders. It isn't mine to do so unless I used my own tribal community.

Second, I can create a complex history. I'll keep general external events the same such as the Dawes Act, relocation acts, and Indian wars, but I can create a unique relationship between the US and these respective tribes without needing to contact tribal and military historians.

Third, I don't want to add to the numerous books that talk about the Lakota, Cheyenne, Kiowa, or Apache people as if these were the only tribes, or cultures, that existed.

Finally, if you are Native and you write about Native people, you will deal with identity politics regardless of your intention. Your boodlines will be examined. Your indianness will be picked apart. I hope that by printing under a pen-name and using these 'invented' tribes, I can bypass all of that.

kuwisdelu · May 27, 2013

As a Native person, this would piss me off.

Cranky1 said:
Finally, if you are Native and you write about Native people, you will deal with identity politics regardless of your intention. Your boodlines will be examined. Your indianness will be picked apart. I hope that by printing under a pen-name and using these 'invented' tribes, I can bypass all of that.

Are you Native?

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

I'm a quarter blood. My tribe is located down in Oklahoma.

What would piss you off? The tribes or the identity policing?

susanielson · May 27, 2013

Cranky1 said:
I am writing the first book of a five or six book series that are tied together by members of an American Indian nation. Only one book will focus on a tribal member who actually lives on the 'rez' while the other books have characters who live in urban centers.

There are a few reasons why I am doing this.

First, I can invent a language, ceremonies, and inner conflicts; using an existing tribe and its language, ceremonies, and inner conflicts mean that I am exposing the traditional values of that community to outsiders. It isn't mine to do so unless I used my own tribal community.

Second, I can create a complex history. I'll keep general external events the same such as the Dawes Act, relocation acts, and Indian wars, but I can create a unique relationship between the US and these respective tribes without needing to contact tribal and military historians.

Third, I don't want to add to the numerous books that talk about the Lakota, Cheyenne, Kiowa, or Apache people as if these were the only tribes, or cultures, that existed.

Finally, if you are Native and you write about Native people, you will deal with identity politics regardless of your intention. Your boodlines will be examined. Your indianness will be picked apart. I hope that by printing under a pen-name and using these 'invented' tribes, I can bypass all of that.

I am not native, bit I lived and worked on the Navajo Res for four year. If you should need an outsider's take on res life all you need do is ask.

kuwisdelu · May 27, 2013

Cranky1 said:
I'm a quarter blood. My tribe is located down in Oklahoma.

Why not write about them? Or another nearby tribe?

What would piss you off? The tribes or the identity policing?

Making up a tribe instead of using a real one.

I'm half-Zuni, and I feel many of the same fears and anxieties as you do.

But I don't think this is something you can take the easy way out on and still have it feel real and meaningful.

How do you identify? What's important to you? I think you need to answer these questions for yourself, regardless of what others may think, and write from there.

You're shying away from the truly difficult issues, and I think it will show in the series.

ETA: To do what you want to do, I think it would be better to use a completely fantasy setting.

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

I disagree that I am shying away from the real issues. I have chosen to highlight the issues that I don't think most non-Natives would know about.I'm predominately Black, but I have an Indian surname through my paternal grandfather. I was known as the 'Black girl with an Indian name' by my Native friends.

One of my 'tribal communities' include descendants of Buffalo Soldiers who were brought into the territory to subdue the other tribe. These two tribes now live on the same reservation even though they are historical enemies.

I did not wish to pursue the Freedmen route. I also did not go to the Northeast because I wanted the conflict between the tribes and the US government to be more recent history.

If you are familiar with the romance genre, then you know that Native characters are typically relegated to 'half-breeds' who struggle to find where they belong. This is legitimate, but the emphasis is typically on White/Indian dynamic.

I am not sure what the other half of your heritage is, but if you are part Black like me, then I am sure you have dealt with non-Natives questioning how someone can be bother Black and Native as if you can only identify with one historically oppressed group.

thothguard51 · May 27, 2013

kuwisdelu said:
To do what you want to do, I think it would be better to use a completely fantasy setting.

Non-native, but I have to agree with kuwisdelu. Reason... if you are inventing tribes, based on known cultures, someone is always going to make a comparison, and then complain that you did not get it right, or that is your limited experience.

In fantasy, so long as the believability factor is there, readers are bit more forgiving...

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

Sorry, I'm outright dismissing fantasy.

I'm not using known cultures to detail my tribe. I'm using known historical policies to detail my tribe.

kuwisdelu · May 27, 2013

Cranky1 said:
I am not sure what the other half of your heritage is, but if you are part Black like me, then I am sure you have dealt with non-Natives questioning how someone can be bother Black and Native as if you can only identify with one historically oppressed group.

I'm not part black, but I think that would make an incredibly interesting story. I don't understand why you feel the need to make up new tribes in order to tell it.

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

Because it is fiction and I can create a fictional history of two complex communities.

thothguard51 · May 27, 2013

Write then and we'll see...

kuwisdelu · May 27, 2013

Cranky1 said:
Because it is fiction and I can create a fictional history of two complex communities.

Fictional communities.

If that's what you want to do, that's fine.

But if you don't want to deal with the difficulties that using real-life tribes presents, that makes it much less interesting to me, and kind of undermines whatever themes of identity you might present in your story, IMO.

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

There are over 500 tribal communities and each of them have their own unique inner conflicts. I can take real policies and programs to create the boundaries around my fictional communities.

I will talk about disenrollment. I will talk about using federal courts to resolve Indian issues related to tribal sovereignty. I will talk about one faction supporting casinos and another faction not supporting casinos. I will talk about Natives who enlist into the US military, the Army in particular. I think these themes are near universe across many, many tribes.

kuwisdelu · May 27, 2013

Cranky1 said:
There are over 500 tribal communities and each of them have their own unique inner conflicts.

But that's what makes them interesting.

I can take real policies and programs to create the boundaries around my fictional communities.

I will talk about disenrollment. I will talk about using federal courts to resolve Indian issues related to tribal sovereignty. I will talk about one faction supporting casinos and another faction not supporting casinos. I will talk about Natives who enlist into the US military, the Army in particular. I think these themes are near universe across many, many tribes.

I think you're trying too hard to be generic and universal, and that is usually detrimental to a story.

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

As you said, we shall see.

Going back to you being pissed. You made that comment and followed up with asking if I was Native. I wonder if your outrage was based on the assumption that I was a non-Native making this decision.

cornflake · May 27, 2013

I'm not from a native tribe or related to anyone who is, to my knowledge, so from an entirely outside perspective I have a question which may be dumb but what the heck.

From what I know about the U.S. native tribes (which is basically from basic history classes and stuff and thus very little). there are a LOT of them - like it's not like Canada with the six First Nations main groups (could be wrong about that too, heh). So, basically, were I to pick the OP's theoretical book up and read about real historical events and places - how would I know the tribe wasn't real? Besides the basic little 'resemblance to persons...' disclaimer or what have you, I think I'd just presume it was real, which would seem to negate the point? I may be missing something on either side of the point though.

kuwisdelu · May 27, 2013

Cranky1 said:
I wonder if your outrage was based on the assumption that I was a non-Native making this decision.

Nope. I was asking because if you were, I wanted to ask this:

kuwisdelu said:
How do you identify? What's important to you? I think you need to answer these questions for yourself, regardless of what others may think, and write from there.

You said:

Finally, if you are Native and you write about Native people, you will deal with identity politics regardless of your intention. Your boodlines will be examined. Your indianness will be picked apart. I hope that by printing under a pen-name and using these 'invented' tribes, I can bypass all of that.

And I think this is something we have to confront head-on. You have to ask yourself whether you're writing as an insider, or an outsider, or something in between. What exactly is your own perspective and identity?

You also said:

using an existing tribe and its language, ceremonies, and inner conflicts mean that I am exposing the traditional values of that community to outsiders. It isn't mine to do so unless I used my own tribal community.

Would you be comfortable doing so with your own tribal community? With only certain parts of it?

Like I said, it kind of feels to me like you're trying to avoid making difficult decisions.

Also like I said, many of these are issues I struggle with myself, and you've reminded me of a thread I've been meaning to make...

mirandashell · May 27, 2013

As a total outsider, can I ask a question? I've seen your other thread, Kuwi, and isn't Cranky avoiding the same problem you are talking about by creating her own tribe? A similar thing been done in SF for years. It becomes easier and often more interesting to reflect the human condition through another species. So is Cranky not doing the same thing?

kuwisdelu · May 27, 2013

mirandashell said:
I've seen your other thread, Kuwi, and isn't Cranky avoiding the same problem you are talking about by creating her own tribe?

Yes, it's avoiding it, in a way that I kind of view as a cop-out.

A similar thing been done in SF for years. It becomes easier and often more interesting to reflect the human condition through another species. So is Cranky not doing the same thing?

That's why I suggested making it an entirely fantasy setting.

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

There is a difference between identity and identification. I am a member of a tribal community, a member of an urban Indian community, and a member of the Black American community. Identity is of your own construction, but it does not mean that others will necessarily identify you as such.

How others identify me will be different based upon their own knowledge of history, culture, and so on.

I have known full-bloods who have entered the room, scanned it, and then dismissed the room as non-Natives, because no one else looked full-blood. My community doesn't have a reservation; most non-Natives assume that every tribe lives and exists on a reservation. I have known people who grew up on the rez treat those from urban communities as less than because they came from an inter-tribal community. Well-known Native heroes have descendants and it has been my experience that the descendants divide themselves between who can legitimately speak as a member of that legendary person's family. These are inner community squabbles that Natives know about but many non-Natives won't understand.

The real question that needs to be addressed, and not why I would invent a tribe or not, is who is my audience? Am I writing towards other Natives or am I writing to the mainstream audience? I'm writing to the mainstream; those people who think that the only problems that Natives deal with are those related to violence, alcohol, and poverty.

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

mirandashell said:
As a total outsider, can I ask a question? I've seen your other thread, Kuwi, and isn't Cranky avoiding the same problem you are talking about by creating her own tribe? A similar thing been done in SF for years. It becomes easier and often more interesting to reflect the human condition through another species. So is Cranky not doing the same thing?

It's my thread. I find it rather disrespectful to pose questions about me to another poster.

You want to know my thought process, why not pose your questions to me? I do not need anyone else to speak on my behalf.

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

cornflake said:
I'm not from a native tribe or related to anyone who is, to my knowledge, so from an entirely outside perspective I have a question which may be dumb but what the heck.

From what I know about the U.S. native tribes (which is basically from basic history classes and stuff and thus very little). there are a LOT of them - like it's not like Canada with the six First Nations main groups (could be wrong about that too, heh). So, basically, were I to pick the OP's theoretical book up and read about real historical events and places - how would I know the tribe wasn't real? Besides the basic little 'resemblance to persons...' disclaimer or what have you, I think I'd just presume it was real, which would seem to negate the point? I may be missing something on either side of the point though.

I don't know how many nations exist in Canada but there are many more than 6. I believe that there are as many or more tribal groups in Canada than in the US.

And you have really hit the true question on its head. Someone who isn't familiar with the various Native communities probably won't know that my tribal groups were invented until I said otherwise. Meanwhile, by reading my book, they will learn about some of the complex issues that many tribal groups deal with.

mirandashell · May 27, 2013

Cranky1 said:
It's my thread. I find it rather disrespectful to pose questions about me to another poster.

You want to know my thought process, why not pose your questions to me? I do not need anyone else to speak on my behalf.

Ah. I'm sorry if I've offended you but that question was actually to Kuwi, not you. As an outsider, I agree with what you plan to do and was puzzled as to why Kuwi objected to it. So the question wasn't to or about you.

Cranky1 · May 27, 2013

mirandashell said:
Ah. I'm sorry if I've offended you but that question was actually to Kuwi, not you. As an outsider, I agree with what you plan to do and was puzzled as to why Kuwi objected to it. So the question wasn't to or about you.

Eh. My apologies. Now you know why I call myself "Cranky1".

kuwisdelu · May 27, 2013

Cranky1 said:
The real question that needs to be addressed, and not why I would invent a tribe or not, is who is my audience? Am I writing towards other Natives or am I writing to the mainstream audience? I'm writing to the mainstream; those people who think that the only problems that Natives deal with are those related to violence, alcohol, and poverty.

If your audience is primarily people who don't identify as Native, then you probably won't have any problems.

I answered your question as someone who identifies as Native (but is surely not always identified as such by other Natives). ETA: Although now that I go back and read your OP, you don't have any questions at all, simply a declaration that this is what you're doing, which makes me wonder what the purpose of this thread was.

I've invented two tribes.

practical experience, FTW

Revolutionize the World

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A Gentleman of a refined age...

practical experience, FTW

Revolutionize the World

practical experience, FTW

A Gentleman of a refined age...

Revolutionize the World

practical experience, FTW

Revolutionize the World

practical experience, FTW

practical experience, FTW

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practical experience, FTW

practical experience, FTW

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