Chapter 7
In: Imaginative Ecologies
Search for other papers by Imelda Martín-Junquera in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Purchase instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):
Abstract
Simon Ortiz’s poetry mainly focuses on the recovery of a “storytelling” tradition and the culture of the indigenous American ancestry at large. His stories, however, tend to explore different themes and so, they appear as windows which open to new possibilities for the improvement of the life conditions for Native Americans. Harjo, on her part, deals with everyday life events and how they acquire significance for her. At the same time, the natural and human element appear in combination, in perfect symbiosis with this traditional culture in both writers who struggle with their literary productions to produce a significant change towards the creation of interspecies relationships in their local areas. Men on the Moon by Ortiz and the narrative poems by Joy Harjo included in A Map to the Next World: Poems and Tales represent an escape from the isolation and marginalization of the human being, an exit towards a transformation which projects a hope and a transition to contemplate the creation of regenerative communities in ecocritical and posthuman terms.