(Indigenous) Place and Time as Formal Strategy

What is it about?

Indigenous dystopian fiction presents not only the crisis of the future but the ongoing crisis of the present time, and that which is still resonant from the past. Accordingly, the potential healing of moments or processes of crisis in Indigenous dystopias is never possible without a strategic engagement with narrative itself, and even the formal aspects of the text. Storytelling, and a focus on space, place, and time in both the content and formal aspects of a story are factors in reconciling characters with that which inflicts them: in this sense, the dystopian Indigenous narrative is an engagement with environmental crisis, with the crisis of place and space, and must heal relationships with nature through a process of return to the cultural values inherent in a previous time and place.

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Why is it important?

This article is part of a seminal collection of essays on the emerging field of Indigenous Futurisms. The study of speculative and dystopian fictions, for instance, in Indigenous literature, is gaining increasing attention, and this article examines two short stories by well-known Indigenous writers who are becoming increasingly important as storytellers. The piece analyzes each story closely in terms of structural aspects, but also meditates on the use of time and place as the narrators struggle to wrest themselves from dire situations. Social and environmental crises connect both stories with the concerns of the now, and my piece works to understand the relevancy of these disasters for a wider readership. The two stories under discussion are important not only to considerations of Indigenous literature, but also hallmark pieces in the broader range of dystopian literature.

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