From the Editor: Indigenous Performance

Volume 25 begins with a wide-ranging assortment of work in American Indian literary studies and American Indian self-representation. All of the pieces share, however, a central interest in Indigenous performances of one kind or another. Rochelle Zuck begins the issue with an investigation of William Apess's strategic reworking, in his 1836 Eulogy on King Philip, of the theory that Native Americans descended from the lost tribes of Israel. In Apess's deft rhetorical performance, Zuck demonstrates, the European theory of lost tribes becomes an affirmation of Native political legitimacy and a retort to US nationalism and territorial expansion. Elizabeth Horan and Seonghoon Kim turn our attention to LeAnne Howe's early twenty-first-century performance, in her 2005 collection of poems and stories titled Evidence of Red, of her own theory of "tribalography," which she has developed in several important essays. Horan and Kim focus, especially, on Howe's enactment of Indigenous transformations and Indigenous connections across multiple genres. Jeane T'áawxíwaa Breinig then describes the process of an oral history project among Alaskan Haida elders. The elders' performances during their interviews surprise their younger, urban interlocutors, including Breinig, for the elders do more than simply reveal history and explain traditions; they also offer models for how their younger counterparts might perform their own identities as contemporary Haida. Breinig's essay is accompanied by just such a performance in her poem titled "Raven, Carry Me." The issue concludes with satire by Geary Hobson, who performs a critical analysis of American Indian performances of, shall we say, a particular kind. Although such performances are not often discussed within the hallowed halls of academe, Hobson's revealing essay is sure to interest all readers of SAIL.