A final note about how to prepare for seminars
In the previous posts, I have given you a couple of hints about how to read and prepare for seminars. When you are reading a text, you should not just read the book from front to back. Help yourself by learning about the context surrounding the text.
You should:
1. Learn what you can about the historical context in which the text was produced.
2. Learn what you can about the author and where this text fits into an author's work.
3. See if you can find some reviews of the book. No, I don't mean reviews on Amazon.com or other commercial websites. I mean published book reviews of the kind that you will have to write for this class. For instance, you can find the following review in pdf version at:
Bennett review of Deloria
Robert L. Bennett, Review of “Custer Died for Your Sins,”” By Vine Deloria, Jr., 1970 Wash. U. L. Q. 218 (1970)
Monday, August 27, 2012
As you are reading Custer Died for Your Sins, you can also use additional resources to contextualize your understanding of the period during which the text was first written and published. Here is one documentary trailer. If you find other useful resources that you can share with your classmates, please post them on the blog.
Friday, August 24, 2012
How to Participate in Seminar
As we embark on on journey this semester, I realize that some of you are new to taking graduate seminar courses. I thought it would be helpful to direct you to some resources that can orient you to this kind of academic process.
Click on the links below to get some advice on how to prepare for and participate in seminars:
How to be a Good Seminar Participant
Succeeding in a Graduate Seminar
For each class meeting, prepare some points or questions that you would like to discuss. Take good notes on the text so that you can refer your fellow seminar participants to the specific passages you are looking at. If you are unsure about where to begin, try these as prompts:
- I’d like to talk with people about…
- I’m confused about…
- This author's ideas about ____ seem connected to our reading about ________, because...
- The author says they are going to show/argue __________. Here is where I think s/he is successful. Here is where I think there are weaknesses.
- This idea in the text is really useful to me because.....
- I have questions about…
- What does it mean when the author says…
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Saturday, August 18, 2012
Speak to me of justice...
By Waziyatwin, Ph.D.
Wahpetunwan Dakota from the Pezihutazizi Otunwe (Yellow Medicine Village),
Minisota Makoce,
Taken from Anpao Duta (Newspaper), a free Twin Cities periodical
Speak to me of justice when the beneficiaries of genocide feel the anguish of my ancestors and beg our forgiveness,
When every one of the inheritors of stolen land engages in personal and collective acts of reparative justice,
When 38 white men swing from the gallows in Mankato,
When bounties are placed on the scalps of Minisota racists,
When the pilfered minerals are restored to the mines and pillaged ancient forests sprawl with white pines,
When mercury ceases to contaminate our beloved rivers and our people can drink from their pristine waters,
When waters teem with fish and they can swim freely unobstructed from locks and dams,
When every last drain tile is pulled from the earth and crushed into rubble,
When our wetlands have been restored to wetlands and farmlands are restored to prairie,
When every gas-line, oil-pipeline, and electrical, fiber-optic, and telephone cable is pulled from the earth,
When power stations and transmission pylons come toppling to the ground,
When corporations are destroyed and corporate leaders run fleeing for their lives,
When coal-fired power plants cease to operate,
When the boards of directors of NSP and Xcel energy are forced to consume the toxic waste they’ve produced at Prairie Island before their bodies are entombed in storage casks and sent straight to hell,
When industrial farmers liberate their animals and restore the topsoil eroded from decades of their monoculture nightmare,
When animals are prayed back from extinction,
When bison are populating our western prairies and elk are roaming our northern forests,
When not a single acre of our beloved homeland is feeding industrial civilization,
When Monsanto research facilities are blown up, their research files deleted, and every one of their employees has issued a personal apology to all of creation,
When every mile of paved earth is released from bondage and every building of concrete and steel is dismantled,
When every railroad car is pushed into retirement and the railroads are disassembled,
When cultivated paddy rice is outlawed and wild rice is allowed to be wild,
When every last monument to colonialism burned to the ground,
When Minnesotans no longer speak the names of Ramsey and Sibley without shame and Dakota resistance leaders are hailed as heroes,
When Dakota people are once again, wildricing, sugarbushing, digging bdo, tipsinna and tewapa, praying and dancing at our sacred sites and drinking from our sacred springs,
When our people return from exile,
When mothers can suckle our children without toxic chemicals contaminating our milk,
When we are once again allowed to experience the freedom of living our birthright,
When our mother earth is no longer crying,
When she can breathe freely and nurture her children at her breast,
Speak to me of justice when settler society has returned the 54 million acres in Minisota Makoce stolen from my people.
By Waziyatwin, Ph.D.
Wahpetunwan Dakota from the Pezihutazizi Otunwe (Yellow Medicine Village),
Minisota Makoce,
Taken from Anpao Duta (Newspaper), a free Twin Cities periodical
Speak to me of justice when the beneficiaries of genocide feel the anguish of my ancestors and beg our forgiveness,
When every one of the inheritors of stolen land engages in personal and collective acts of reparative justice,
When 38 white men swing from the gallows in Mankato,
When bounties are placed on the scalps of Minisota racists,
When the pilfered minerals are restored to the mines and pillaged ancient forests sprawl with white pines,
When mercury ceases to contaminate our beloved rivers and our people can drink from their pristine waters,
When waters teem with fish and they can swim freely unobstructed from locks and dams,
When every last drain tile is pulled from the earth and crushed into rubble,
When our wetlands have been restored to wetlands and farmlands are restored to prairie,
When every gas-line, oil-pipeline, and electrical, fiber-optic, and telephone cable is pulled from the earth,
When power stations and transmission pylons come toppling to the ground,
When corporations are destroyed and corporate leaders run fleeing for their lives,
When coal-fired power plants cease to operate,
When the boards of directors of NSP and Xcel energy are forced to consume the toxic waste they’ve produced at Prairie Island before their bodies are entombed in storage casks and sent straight to hell,
When industrial farmers liberate their animals and restore the topsoil eroded from decades of their monoculture nightmare,
When animals are prayed back from extinction,
When bison are populating our western prairies and elk are roaming our northern forests,
When not a single acre of our beloved homeland is feeding industrial civilization,
When Monsanto research facilities are blown up, their research files deleted, and every one of their employees has issued a personal apology to all of creation,
When every mile of paved earth is released from bondage and every building of concrete and steel is dismantled,
When every railroad car is pushed into retirement and the railroads are disassembled,
When cultivated paddy rice is outlawed and wild rice is allowed to be wild,
When every last monument to colonialism burned to the ground,
When Minnesotans no longer speak the names of Ramsey and Sibley without shame and Dakota resistance leaders are hailed as heroes,
When Dakota people are once again, wildricing, sugarbushing, digging bdo, tipsinna and tewapa, praying and dancing at our sacred sites and drinking from our sacred springs,
When our people return from exile,
When mothers can suckle our children without toxic chemicals contaminating our milk,
When we are once again allowed to experience the freedom of living our birthright,
When our mother earth is no longer crying,
When she can breathe freely and nurture her children at her breast,
Speak to me of justice when settler society has returned the 54 million acres in Minisota Makoce stolen from my people.
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