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A review by essinink
Lakota Woman by Mary Crow Dog
4.0
When people say to read different perspectives, this is probably the kind of book they have in mind. What I thought I knew about the history of relations between the U.S. Government and the Native populations really only scratched the surface of reality.
Mary Crow Dog (née Brave Bird) is quite a woman. Lakota Woman is a topical autobiography (rather than strictly chronological) focusing on her background and her involvement with the American Indian Movement (AIM) in the 1970s, including the occupation of Wounded Knee. There's also quite a bit in here about her complicated marriage to Leonard Crow Dog. (They have since divorced, but were still married at the time that this book was published.)
Much of this material was new to me. It's a view from the inside so disconnected from the rest of my knowledge base that I'm still figuring out where it all fits. But it's important. Reading a book like this is like sitting down and listening at the teller's knee. Just listening. And in the listening, coming to realize how different and how similar you are. You cannot read a book like this without having at least some chinks made in the armor of naïve realism.
Mary Crow Dog (née Brave Bird) is quite a woman. Lakota Woman is a topical autobiography (rather than strictly chronological) focusing on her background and her involvement with the American Indian Movement (AIM) in the 1970s, including the occupation of Wounded Knee. There's also quite a bit in here about her complicated marriage to Leonard Crow Dog. (They have since divorced, but were still married at the time that this book was published.)
Much of this material was new to me. It's a view from the inside so disconnected from the rest of my knowledge base that I'm still figuring out where it all fits. But it's important. Reading a book like this is like sitting down and listening at the teller's knee. Just listening. And in the listening, coming to realize how different and how similar you are. You cannot read a book like this without having at least some chinks made in the armor of naïve realism.