Publisher Description
Celebrated novelist David Treuer has gained a reputation for writing fiction that expands the horizons of Native American literature. In Rez Life, his first full-length work of nonfiction, Treuer brings a novelist’s storytelling skill and an eye for detail to a complex and subtle examination of Native American reservation life, past and present. With authoritative research and reportage, Treuer illuminates misunderstood contemporary issues of sovereignty, treaty rights, and natural-resource conservation. He traces the waves of public policy that have disenfranchised and exploited Native Americans, exposing the tension that has marked the historical relationship between the United States government and the Native American population. Through the eyes of students, teachers, government administrators, lawyers, and tribal court judges, he shows how casinos, tribal government, and the Bureau of Indian Affairs have transformed the landscape of Native American life. A member of the Ojibwe of northern Minnesota, Treuer grew up on Leech Lake Reservation, but was educated in mainstream America. Exploring crime and poverty, casinos and wealth, and the preservation of native language and culture, Rez Life is a strikingly original work of history and reportage, a must listen for anyone interested in the Native American story.
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“Rez Life is a deft, smart, thought-provoking examination of both historical and contemporary reservations in the United States, primarily told through the cultural stories of the Ojibwe of the Upper Midwest. Each chapter tackles a different issue in Ojibwe country – treaty rights, language, enrollment, criminal justice, education, casinos – tracing the historical roots of contemporary problems, challenges, and successes, and weaving the stories of individual Ojibwe throughout. The chapters are wide-ranging, which is a testament to the fact that nothing is particularly simple when talking about the history, administration, or lived experience of reservations. There’s much that’s heart-breaking about the stories that Treuer tells (historical and otherwise) but there are some fantastically funny moments, delicious pieces of irony, and much that’s both defiant and hopeful. A great read.”
—
Catherine (4 out of 5 stars)
