This essay aims to show that serious and robust engagement with Native American Studies and Red feminist research, methods, and theories contribute to the epistemological core of Ethnic Studies and produce new and important understandings of phenomenology, resistance, coloniality, and structures. Native American Studies and Red feminism are situated in relationship to Ethnic Studies and Feminist Studies to question the ongoing necessity of Native American scholars to occupy academic spaces. Ultimately, this paper illustrates how Native American Studies and Red feminism offer inroads to understanding the matrix of coloniality and the systematic efforts of Native American scholars, including Red feminists, to arrive at an Ethnic Studies that works for the people and serves in efforts to achieve social justice and Native American sovereignty simultaneously.
Situating Native American Studies and Red Feminisms: Sustaining Ethnic Studies Available to Purchase
Dr. Leece M. Lee-Oliver (Blackfeet/Wyandot/Cherokee/Choctaw) is an Assistant Professor of Women's Studies and Director of American Indian Studies at Fresno State University. Her work examines the community activism and conditions that arise when national policies and societal beliefs pose challenges to peoples' sovereignty, safety, and security, and the roles that women and gender non-conforming peoples play in community survival. Dr. Lee-Oliver's book manuscript, Red Feminist Roots: American Indian Women, Coloniality, and the Liturgies of Death and Life, focuses on the phenomenon of American Indian women's racialization as a trajectory that reflects the long shadow of colonial racism and heteronormativity that leave American Indian women and girls vulnerable to an epidemic rate of violence today. The book pays homage to American Indian women leaders whose legacies of resistance embrace cultural traditions in order to promote and protect American Indian lifeways, historically and today.
Leece M. Lee-Oliver; Situating Native American Studies and Red Feminisms: Sustaining Ethnic Studies. Ethnic Studies Review 1 October 2019; 42 (2): 196–209. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/esr.2019.42.2.196
Download citation file:
Sign in
Client Account
Sign in via your Institution
Sign in via your Institution
University of California Press