Generative Adversity: Shapeshifting Pauline/Leopolda in "Tracks" and "Love Medicine"
1997; University of Nebraska Press; Volume: 21; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.2307/1185722
ISSN1534-1828
Autores Tópico(s)Postcolonial and Cultural Literary Studies
ResumoThe shapeshifting of a human being into the form and consciousness of an animal a lower category of being opposed to human status has horrified and stymied the Western imagination for hundreds of years, as evidenced by European and colonial witch hunts and executions. But the fullest interpretation. of certain texts by Chippewa authors will only yield itself when we accept shapeshifting as part of the human repertoire. In fact the generatrix of the Chippewa world presents certain of its sacred faces in animal form and is a divinity that cannot be identified as a stable, static being, but rather through the distinctive interplay of its shapeshifting components. Such a kinetic sacredness not metaphor but lived experience, not subject but activity challenges the very basis of Western ontology and epistemology in a valuable and productive
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