Reviews tagging 'Alcoholism'

A Mind Spread Out on the Ground by Alicia Elliott

30 reviews

gnosila's review against another edition

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challenging informative reflective medium-paced

4.5

In this series of essays, Elliot fluidly blends memoir with data to discuss her experiences with mental health, abuse, and poverty in the context of the systemic abuse and genocide perpetrated against indigenous people in the US and Canada. The essays are both  thought-provoking and informative.

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raelin's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

5.0

What a great book. 

This book covers so many categories, since each chapter is written almost as a stand alone essay then grouped together to make one book that does tie every chapter together into a cohesive work. It is masterfully done. 

All people represented in this work are dimensional humans, with several different facets. Her mother isn’t just a bipolar religious fanatic. Her father isn’t just an alcoholic abuser. They are also caring, loving, supportive parents. This is how real people are, but not often how people are captured in the written word. The beautiful contradictions that fill our relationships with people are so accurately described. 

This book is so much more than memoir. It is also history, inspires self reflection (by directly asking the reader to answer hard questions about their perspective), insight into the writing process, commentary on social media, self persecution, and so much more. 

A definite must read for everyone that can handle the content warnings. 

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nicolejlevy's review against another edition

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challenging informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.5


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remib's review against another edition

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dark emotional informative reflective medium-paced

4.5


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shewantsthediction's review

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challenging informative reflective sad medium-paced

3.0

Somewhere between 2 and 3 stars for me. I expected to like this a lot more from the way everyone gushes about it, but the writing style was extremely random. She'd bring up a topic, go on a tangent about something else, then randomly return to said topic, over and over again for the whole book. Sometimes she'd drop topics completely, which made for a jarring listening experience. I also didn't realize this was supposed to be a book of essays until the first one ended and I found out it wasn't memoir. She said several things I disagree with when it comes to trauma, but all of the indigenous stuff was obviously spot on.

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biancafrancisco's review against another edition

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dark emotional informative reflective sad fast-paced

5.0

Through a very personal narrative - using herself, her family and her nation as examples - the author touches upon more themes than I can mention, connecting bridges between a myriad of crucial societal issues, always leading back to the macro vision of the effect of capitalism, colonialism and the action of the state on people, while simultaneously making us keep checking our prejudices.

The book teaches you a lot about the issues indigenous communities and individuals struggle with (most that were imposed on them by colonizers), and how not only they are still dealing with and trying to heal from the very real and tangibly present damage this legacy of colonialism and genocide has transfered through generations, but are simultaneously dealing with modern versions of the same violence nowadays. 

I was surprised to see, that through the connections she makes between several systemic structures, there was much for me to relate to as well. I'm an immensely priviledged white european, but I'm still a woman, I'm still a daughter, I'm still bound by the constraints of capitalism and the patriarchy as well as witness to intergenerational trauma, to mention a few, and, in the end, you can't accurately assess any structural issue without it intertwining with the others.

All in all, I recommend it to literally everyone, as I think there's learning opportunities in this book for all of us. I'm extremely glad I picked it up. 

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indrabindra's review

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emotional reflective

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liteartha's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative reflective

4.0


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laurendenton's review

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adventurous dark emotional informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.25


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coralie_michon's review

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challenging emotional informative inspiring medium-paced

5.0

wow. pendant l'espace de 24h, je me suis immergée dans la culture d'Alicia Elliott, une femme avec une plume impressionnante ayant un père autochtone et une mère catholique. elle raconte sa vie, celle de sa famille, mais surtout, celle d'une communauté qui a été forcée de garder le silence pendant beaucoup trop longtemps... 

elle est une femme si courageuse pour avoir trouvé la force d'écrire et publier cette collection d'essais et j'en suis particulièrement reconnaissante. elle donne au lecteur la chance de réfléchir sur plusieurs éléments de la culture nord américaine basée sur le colonialisme et l'effacement du passé. elle met en lumière plusieurs conséquences de l'arrivée des européens sur les territoires autochtones que nous voyons pas du premier regard. elle le fait à travers d'anecdotes de sa propre vie, ce qui a un effet immense sur notre perception de la situation. 

elle raconte la vérité sur le racisme, le colonisation, le génocide, l'arrachement de culture, la violence, les injustices, la pauvreté, les réserves, les tentatives d'assimilation, la santé mentale, les abus sexuels et plusieurs autres éléments qui l'ont touchées, elle et sa communauté. elle parle de façon crue, directe, certaine. elle n'a pas peur d'exprimer ses opinions et raconter son expérience. elle s'en est sortie, elle en est très reconnaissante. elle connait sa chance, chance qu'une grande majorité des siens n'ont pas eu par le passé, n'ont pas en ce moment et n'auront jamais dans le futur. 

lire cette oeuvre a changé ma vie. étudiant en histoire, j'ai eu plusieurs cours de l'histoire nord-américaine. jamais, au grand jamais, je n'ai eu l'opportunité d'en apprendre autant sur la culture indigène et jamais, je n'ai appris toutes ses injustices. le curriculum canadien cache beaucoup de secret par rapport au passé ( quoique le présent n'est pas transparent non plus ) et je me sens reconnaissante d'avoir eu la chance de lire ce livre et de me renseigner sur les enjeux actuels en lien avec le passé paternaliste canadien.

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