Research in Western American Literature: 1997–1998

R e s e a r c h in W e s t e r n A m e ric a n L it e r a t u r e : 1997-1998 J a n R o u s h In my 1998 column, I noted what to me was an astounding surge of interest in Native American topics of all sorts. Once again I am astounded. Let me begin by noting that there is apparently a surge of interest in western American topics in almost every discipline recorded in both Dissertation Abstracts and Masters Abstracts International. That trend appears in the West, where one might expect such a focus, and in every other region of the United States and Canada, including that so-called bastion of conservancy: the East. This year, I have included 239 theses and dissertations in my annual listing, up from 135 last year. O f these, the category that con­ tained the greatest number of studies and the greatest variety of top­ ics within those studies was Native American issues with 95 different studies, followed at a considerable distance by women and/or gender issues with 28 titles. Aspects of wilderness, landscape, the environ­ ment, or ecological issues totaled 19 separate titles, with another 5 focusing specifically on sense of place and 3 on nature writing itself. Curious to see how those figures have played out in the past, I went back to WAL’s winter 1987 edition— when I first started writing “Research in Western American Literature”— and followed the trends over the succeeding twelve years. Then I went back to the winter 1967 issue, the first issue to contain the research column, to see what Y e a r D iss. M A /M S R e s e a r c h T r e n d T o t a l 1967 15 4 15 Individual authors; 4 Steinbeck 19 1987 79 8 25 Native American 87 1988 68 13 26 Native American 81 1989 96 13 21 Native American 109 1990 62 11 17 Native American 73 1991 71 6 22 Native American; 12 Nature/Landscape 77 1992 96 26 34 Native American 122 1993 72 10 23 Native American 82 1994 54 14 15 W omen/Gender; 13 Native American 68 1995 51 9 20 Native American; 15 W omen/Gender 60 1996 64 16 30 Native American 80 1997 76 22 36 Native American 98 1998 115 20 51 Native American 135 1999 182 57 95 Native American 239 J a n R o u s h the research roots for the organization had been. The table summa­ rizes what I found, illustrating the growth in the field as well as its major research trends. S o m e C o n c l u s i o n s Research in the field of western American literature has defi­ nitely proliferated since the beginning of the W LA in 1965; one need only compare the 19 titles in 1967 to 239 in 1999 to see this trend. And the breadth of topics, in spite of an emphasis on what appears to constitute the three major themes in the field (Native American; women, gender, and race/culture; concerns about the land), reflects its viability and its vitality. There is no question that the field has changed. In its early years, research interest focused overwhelmingly on individual authors; the few topics outside this focus typically addressed aspects of the western novel itself. One reason for this emphasis possibly resided in the field’s impetus to define, if not prove, itself early on. In that 1967 issue, Deb Wylder notes a cultural lag in eastern perceptions of western writers and their writing that does not allow Easterners “to see beyond the popularized stereotype of the American W est.... Strangely, the East’s failure is lack of sophistication, the ability to distinguish between the quantities of ‘paperback’ Westerns and the serious novels which are set in the West. The Western writer who wishes to write ‘universally’ is immediately classified according to the stereotype” (241). It was undoubtedly the attempt to counter such stereotypical views that led to WAL’s statement...