Richard Schmitt
ED693
Critiquing Indigenous Literature
Book Review #2

March 20, 2006

Book Title: Raising Ourselves: A Gwich'in Coming of Age Story from the Yukon River.
Author: Velma Wallis
Illustrator: James L. Grant Sr.
Published: 2002
Publisher: Epicenter Press
ISBN: 0-9708493-0-3
Grade Level: Young Adult
Genre: Autobiographical Non-fiction

Summery:

Velma Wallis takes the reader through a lifetime of stories and anecdotes from her early childhood to young adulthood as a Gwich'in Athabascan from Fort Yukon, Alaska. Dominant throughout the stories are the heartrending tales of a child and her siblings abandoned emotionally and physically by their alcoholic parents. Ms. Wallis opens herself and shows us the fears and resilience of little children literally "raising ourselves".

Author:

Velma Wallis, born 1960, is a Gwich'in Athbascan woman from the Yukon River village of Fort Yukon, Alaska. Ms.Wallis is the sixth of thirteen children raised in a two-room log cabin. Her first book, Two Old Women, has been translated into seventeen languages. She has also written Bird Girl. Both books are stories about Athbascan struggle and survival. Raising Ourselves is her third book to date. Ms. Wallis has been awarded the Western States Book Award in 1993, as well as the Northwest Booksellers Association Award. Velma Wallis currently resides in Fort Yukon, Alaska.

Illustrator:

James Grant, born in 1946 and raised in California, is an Athabascan from the village of Tanana, Alaska. He attended Chaffey Loomis College in Alta Loma, California and the University of Alaska in Fairbanks, where he now lives. Mr. Grant traveled and studied art while stationed in Europe with the US Army. In addition to the pen and ink drawings seen in Raising Ourselves and other books by Velma Wallis, Mr.Grant also carves in wood and ivory, does bronze casting, and paints in oil.

Raising Ourselves is also replete with photos from the Wallis family collection.

Tribal Group Portrayed: Gwich'in Athabascan

Stereotypes? / Loaded Words? / Distorted Lifestyles? /

Since Raising Ourselves is an autobiographical non-fiction written by an Athabascan woman about her childhood, concerns of racial stereotypes, distorted lifestyles, etc, are not applicable. Though Velma Wallis may be subject to the same human failings as anyone else, she is telling her story from her point of view and so should not be reviewed in the same way as a fiction about Natives written by a non-native. What is important is to listen to her story with an open mind and a receptive heart.

Discussion:

Raising Ourselves is written in the style of a personal journal since, like a diary,writing the book had a cathartic affect for the author. In the manner of a twelve-step program, telling the truth is the main feature of the stories. Ms. Wallis' dedication in the front of the book is to her mother whom she thanks for giving her blessing for writing honestly. Later she writes "My mother always told the truth, no matter how much it hurt, and when I grew up, that would affect how I told stories" (p. 65).This is important since the book is also about healing the emotional wounds of the past.

Also like a personal journal, Raising Ourselves follows a chronological order which corresponds not only with the author's life, but also with the historical and cultural changes Native people have undergone in the last century. In the beginning of the book, as it was since the beginning of time, the author remembers going to check the fish wheel with her father. The fish are collected and brought back to the village where everyone in the family works together to process the fish. The work is done, lessons are taught, and everyone fulfills their duty in a setting and activity close to nature.

Changes from the outside come in the form of stores, schools, churches, epidemics and alcohol. At first the changes were accepted voluntarily. "Life had been different in my grandmother's time. She embraced everything new, from material goods to belief systems" (p.30). But the changes, including the loss of the Gwich'in language caused generational alienation." Itchoo was always an enigma.She didn't speak fluent English, and her values differed greatly from ours. Tous she was simply an odd little grandmother … She seemed like a foreigner tome" (p. 26).

Epidemics furthered the break in cultural transmission as elders were lost and "…many children were left alone as their parents were sick. Often the parents died leaving these children behind as orphans" (p. 43).

Struggling to deal with wholesale social changes and emotional trauma, the author's family turned to alcohol. "They could display deep emotions only when they were drunk. When they sobered, it was as if they had never said such things to one another,until the next time they drank." (p. 61). And so began the pattern of emotional dysfunction by seeking escape from the pain in alcohol, addiction to bingo and pull-tabs, and the numbing affects of endless television. Each member of the family escaped into their own world.

The teenager Velma Wallis found a way out in the family's traditional trapline. She spent a winter there learning to reconnect to the natural world as well as disconnect from the chaotic and lonely world of town. Periodically her mother joined her at the cabin to sober up and teach her daughter to trap muskrats and beaver. The trapline became a symbol of hope and healing for them. It was a means for them to reconnect with each other.

In her touching Epilogue, Ms. Wallis outlines her recommendations to all Native people. She says that the traditional stories need to be told because "Each year we loose elders who understood the past and spoke our Native language. I fear that our young ones will never know the beauty of the life that existed once upon a time before the coming of drinking and drugs" (p. 210). She recommends that Native people shed the training of outsiders and be proud of who they are and who they have been as a people. She warns against a "… reluctance to move into the future with a healthy balance of the old while we live in the new"(p.211). Finally she warns against an unhealthy sense of nostalgia for the past. "Like an alcoholic, I take one day at a time. I teach myself to look into the future and not yearn for the past and its people; to honor them through their stories but not to fall into the nostalgia which caused so many people to sink into depression." (p. 212).

This is a book that deals with difficult and adult subjects. Caution should be used in reading this to younger children. Pre-reading is recommended.

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