With some success, Native Americans have fought hard to have their voices heard in the narratives about them by predominantly non-Native sources. Those gains are under assault by a new surge of efforts to ban books by Native authors and other works that challenge colonial conventional wisdom. Today on Native America Calling, Shawn Spruce gets a sampling of books that well-meaning parents, administrators, and policy-makers want to keep off of school reading lists and public spaces with Dr. Debbie Reese (Nambe Pueblo), founder of American Indians in Children’s Literature blog; Kevin Maillard (Seminole), author and professor of Law at Syracuse University; Mandi Harris (Cherokee), a children’s librarian and PhD student in Information Science at the University of Washington; and Lynette Dial (Lumbee), a library supervisor for Hoke County Library.
Break 1 Music: The Last World of Fire and Trash (song) Joy Harjo (artist) Native Joy for Real (album)
Break 2 Music: On the Road Missing Home (Corn Dance) (song) Sheldon Sundown (artist) Hand Drum/Smoke N’ Round Dance (album)
Native America Calling is a live call-in program linking public radio stations, the Internet and listeners together in a thought-provoking national conversation about issues specific to Native communities. Each program engages noted guests and experts with callers throughout the United States and is designed to improve the quality of life for Native Americans. Native America Calling is heard on nearly 90 public, community and tribal radio stations in the United States and in Canada.
Produced by Koahnic Broadcast Corporation, a Native-operated media center in Anchorage, Alaska.
Released on August 15th 2022
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