Explorations in Navajo Poetry and Poetics

Conclusion: Multiplying Glimpses of Navajo Poetics

218 Ronald and Suzanne Scollon (1981:53) once argued that, “an Athabaskan cannot, as an Athabaskan, write easily about Athabaskan things.” I think many Navajo poets would disagree with that statement.1 Esther Belin (2007) recently titled an article in Wicazo Sa Review, “Contemporary Navajo Writers’ Relevance to Navajo Society.” In that piece she talks about traveling around the Navajo Nation and surrounding area and speaking to students of all ages about poetry and being a Navajo poet. Navajo poetry is grounded in the lived realities of Navajo people. The focus on the loss of language, the importance of place, or the boarding school experience all informs Navajo poetry. Concerns about how Navajos are represented inform the ways that Navajo poets present themselves and their work. The image of a singular Navajo language, uninfluenced by English, is an image that many Navajo poets help to circulate. Another image, for example, of Navajos as borrowers—so usefully challenged by Erica Bsumek (2004), Jennifer Nez Denetdale (2007b), and James Faris (1990)—may rear its metaphorical head again at the thought of Navajo poetry. The trope of the Navajo as borrower, as Denetdale and Bsumek have shown, has vacillated with the interests of EuroAmericans . When it was in Euro-American interests to present Navajos as recalcitrant, they were represented as unwilling to learn from outsiders , trapped within tradition. When it was in Euro-American interests to highlight Navajos’ willingness as co-participants in their assimilation , Navajos became borrowers. My argument is for neither Navajo Conclusion Multiplying Glimpses of Navajo Poetics How do I know when I know my language is no longer English or Navajo? Esther Berlin (2007:74) multIplyIng glImpses of navajo poetIcs 219 primordialism or essentialism nor Navajos as ubiquitous borrowers. Rather it is to understand how Navajo poets actively engage tradition. I argue, instead, that Navajo poetry is an indigenous articulation (Clifford 2001) whereby Navajos use narrative—hane’—to reckon their place in the world. Navajo poetry is about reckoning, reckoning both one’s place in the world and coming to terms with that place. Contemporary Navajo poetry is a narrative tradition. There has been an active and selective persistence. As Chapter 6 showed, Navajo poets are not confined to the Navajo Nation. Instead they perform around the country and, indeed, around the world. As such, their performances are active displays and assertions of Navajoness. That Navajo poets create positively valorized images of Navajoness should not be surprising. However, as the example from Chapter 6 concerning Tohe suggests, there is often more going on than mere displays of Navajoness. There are also, I argue, subtle and not so subtle claims about place and identity as well. Navajo scholar Lloyd Lee (2006, 2007, and 2008) has recently made a number of powerful arguments in favor of Navajo nationalism, linking nationalism with the promotion of “the Diné language.” Some Navajo poetry resonates with the rhetoric of Navajo nationalism and with Navajo sovereignty as well. Paying attention to the specific forms of Navajo poetry and poetry performances helps reveal how Navajo poets actively engage in narratives of Navajoness and in the construction of imagined (language) communities . Ultimately, Navajo poets, through their poetic displays, help create and maintain narratives of Navajoness. These narratives of Navajoness are not, however, abstractions. Rather they are grounded in specific discursive practices. By paying attention to the poetic forms of such narratives , we also begin to appreciate the voices of individual Navajos. We move beyond abstractions, to an understanding of particular ways that Navajo poets connect with the oral tradition and the audiences that they perform before. Oral tradition and the poetic devices associated with traditional narratives become mechanisms for indigenous articulations. When I first did research on the Navajo Nation in 2000–2001, there were no regular venues for Navajo poets to perform there. The closest thing to such an opportunity was the “open mic” at Diné College in the spring of 2001. When I returned in 2007, Gloria Emerson had opened a 220 conclusIon coffee shop in Shiprock, New Mexico, that irregularly featured Navajo poets, writers, and artists (see www.falconlabs.com/ahweehgohweeh/ culture.htm). At the coffee shop, Navajo books of poetry are now for sale. Likewise, Cool Runnings has now opened a cafe that adjoins the music store. Here, Navajo poets like Blackhorse Mitchell have performed. Such locally controlled means of poetry and expressive production are, I believe, vital to the continuing relevance...