Black Indian / a memoir by Shonda Buchanan.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Buchanan, Shonda, author.

Series:

Made in Michigan writers series

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Buchanan, Shonda.

Buchanan, Shonda--Family.

African American women--Michigan--Biography.

African American women.

Indians of North America--Mixed descent--Michigan--Biography.

Indians of North America.

Multiracial people--Michigan--Biography.

Multiracial people.

African Americans--Relations with Indigenous peoples.

African Americans.

African Americans--Relations with Indians.

Indians of North America--Mixed descent.

Michigan.

Genre:

Biographies.

Autobiographies.

Physical Description:

xii, 333 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm.

Place of Publication:

Detroit : Wayne State University Press, [2019]

Summary:

"Black Indian, searing and raw, is Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club and Alice Walker's The Color Purple meets Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony--only, this isn't fiction. Beautifully rendered and rippling with family dysfunction, secrets, deaths, alcoholism, and old resentments, Shonda Buchanan's memoir is an inspiring story that explores her family's legacy of being African Americans with American Indian roots and how they dealt with not just society's ostracization but the consequences of this dual inheritance. Buchanan was raised as a Black woman, who grew up hearing cherished stories of her multi-racial heritage, while simultaneously suffering from everything she (and the rest of her family) didn't know. Tracing the arduous migration of Mixed Bloods, or Free People of Color, from the Southeast to the Midwest, Buchanan tells the story of her Michigan tribe--a comedic yet manically depressed family of fierce women, who were everything from caretakers and cornbread makers to poets and witches, and men who were either ignored, protected, imprisoned, or maimed--and how their lives collided over love, failure, fights, and prayer despite a stacked deck of challenges, including addiction and abuse. Ultimately, Buchanan's nomadic people endured a collective identity crisis after years of constantly straddling two, then three, races. The physical, spiritual, and emotional displacement of American Indians who met and married Mixed or Black slaves and indentured servants at America's early crossroads is where this powerful journey begins. Black Indian doesn't have answers, nor does it aim to represent every American's multi-ethnic experience. Instead, it digs as far down into this one family's history as it can go--sometimes, with a bit of discomfort. But every family has its own truth, and Buchanan's search for hers will resonate with anyone who has wondered "maybe there's more than what I'm being told.""-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

I The RedBlack Heart

1 Wait p. 3

2 Mourning, 2000 p. 5

3 Ghost Whisperer p. 10

4 High Yellow p. 22

5 Powwows p. 29

6 Mothers and Sons p. 34

7 One Flew Over p. 49

8 Afro-Native Assimilation Blues p. 63

9 Country p. 73

10 Retreat p. 86

11 Something Wicked p. 95

12 About the Land p. 112

II Stomp Dance

13 Vision Quest p. 127

14 Frieda's Dream p. 135

15 Broken Treaties p. 142

16 Bloodletting p. 151

17 Indian Holocaust p. 158

18 Pullman Bloodsport p. 166

19 War Paint p. 182

20 Reservation Dreamer p. 190

21 Blanket Dance p. 195

22 Daddy's War p. 205

23 Leaving Mattawan p. 213

24 The Eastside, Ray Charles, and the Supremes p. 217

25 Tribes and Tragic Mulattoes p. 225

26 Ghost Dance p. 234

27 Miracle Baby p. 245

28 The Dreamers p. 254

III Four Directions and Cowrie Shells

29 Getting Well p. 267

30 Mothers and Daughters p. 275

31 The Making of an Indian p. 281

32 Afro-Native Daughter p. 290

33 A Good Sweat p. 297

IV Mixed Blood Ceremony

34 Willow Women p. 307

35 Rochelle'sOpus p. 312

36 Stories We Sing p. 325.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN:

0814345808

9780814345801

OCLC:

1084339079