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Spiritual Disorientation: A Study of Place in Linda Hogan’s Solar Storms from the Perspective of Human Geography

Received: 16 January 2024     Accepted: 31 January 2024     Published: 20 February 2024
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Abstract

Linda Hogan is a Chickasaw writer grown up in the Native American Renaissance, who feels much obliged to figure out an effective way of guiding the colonized native people out of ecocide and ethnocide wrought by the Euro-American colonization. As an author wholly drenched in the indigenous cosmology, Hogan bestows great concern on the issue of place in the literary creation, which is a pivotal cosmological element in the native epistemological system and thus can be taken as a means for her to decolonize her people. This paper is to investigate the issue of colonization and decolonization through the lens of place in the register of human geography by exploring the spiritual disorientation attributed to land loss represented in her novel Solar Storms (1995). Based on detailed textual analysis, it is unfolded that the spiritual disorientation in the Indian community has been overtly embodied in two aspects: native men’s alcoholism and their conceding to white masculinity, and child abuse conducted by women for their suffering from intergenerational trauma, which truly represents the mental or psychological crisis of indigenous peoples triggered by and attendant to the land loss. In conclusion, the decolonizing process in Hogan’s fiction necessitates reviewing the horrible outcome of the native people’s land loss history so as to enhance their recognition of the communal place, stimulate their sense of community and develop new sites and strategies of resistance.

Published in International Journal of Literature and Arts (Volume 12, Issue 1)
DOI 10.11648/j.ijla.20241201.12
Page(s) 8-15
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Linda Hogan, Place, Land Loss, Spiritual Disorientation, Euro-American Masculinity, Child Abuse

References
[1] Cresswell, Christopher. International Encyclopedia of Human Geography [M]. Eds. Rob Kitchin & Nigel Thrif. Amsterdam: Elsevier Ltd, 2009, p. 4157.
[2] Blair, Elizabeth. “The Politics of Place in Linda Hogan’s Mean Spirit” [J]. Studies in American Indian Literatures 6.3 (Fall 1994): 15-21, p. 20.
[3] Schultermandl, Silvia. “Fighting for the Mother/Land: An Ecofeminist Reading of Linda Hogan’s Solar Storms” [J]. Studies in American Indian Literatures, 17.3 (Fall 2005): 67-84, p. 67. https://doi.org/10.1353/ail.2005.0064
[4] Dreese, Donelle N. Ecocriticism: Creating Self and Place in Environmental and American Indian Literature [M]. New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 2002, p. 112.
[5] Castor, Laura Virginia. “Claiming Place in Wor(l)ds: Linda Hogan’s Solar Storms” [J]. MELUS, 31.2 (2006): 157-180, p. 175. https://doi.org/10.1093/melus/31.2.157
[6] Fang, Hong. “Emplacement, Multilocality and Reinhabitation: A Study of Hogan’s People of the Whale” [J]. Journal of Shanghai Normal University, 2016(5): 91-96, p. 96.
[7] Dreese, Donelle N. “The Terrestrial and Aquatic Intelligence of Linda Hogan” [J]. Studies in American Indian Literatures, 11.4 (Winter 1999): 6-22, p. 17.
[8] Ward, Carol, Elon Stander, and Yodit Solomon, “Resistance through Healing among American Indian Women” [J]. A World-Systems Reader: New Perspectives on Gender, Urbanism, Cultures, Indigenous Peoples, and Ecology, ed. Thomas D. Hall, Lanham. MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000, p. 213, 214. ISBN: 0-8476-9183-7.
[9] Lundquist, Suzanne Evertsen. Native American Literatures: An Introduction [M]. New York: The Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004, p. 262.
[10] Hogan, Linda. Solar Storms [M]. New York: Scribner, 1995.
[11] Jespersen, T. Christine. “Unmapping Adventure: Sewing Resistance in Linda Hogan’s ‘Solar Storms’” [J]. Western American Literature, 45.3(2010): 274-300, p. 287. https://doi.org/10.1353/wal.2010.0006
[12] Hellegers, Desiree. “From Poisson Road to Poison Road: Mapping the Toxic Trail of Windigo Capital in Linda Hogan’s Solar Storms” [J]. Studies in American Indian Literatures, 27. 2 (Summer 2015): 1-28, p. 8, 9. https://doi.org/10.5250/studamerindilite.27.2.0001
[13] Perry, Steven W.. American Indians and Crime: A BJS Statistical Profile, 1992-2002 [M]. Washington DC: US Department of Justice, 2004, p. 7.
[14] Erikson, Kai. “Notes on Trauma and Community” [M]. Trauma: Explorations in Memory. Ed. Cathy Caruth, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995, p. 187.
[15] Caruth, Cathy. Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative, and History [M]. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, p. 35.
[16] Duran, Bonnie, Eduardo Duran, and Maria Yellow Horse Brave Heart. “Native Americans and the Trauma of History” [M]. Studying Native America: Problems and Prospects, Ed. Russel Thornton. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1998, p. 64, 16.
[17] Vernon, Irene S. “‘We Were Those Who Walked out of Bullets and Hunger’: Representation of Trauma and Healing in Solar Storms” [J]. American Indian Quarterly, 36.1(2012): 34-49, p. 36. https://doi.org/10.1353/aiq.2012.a464478
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    Xiaofang, S. (2024). Spiritual Disorientation: A Study of Place in Linda Hogan’s Solar Storms from the Perspective of Human Geography. International Journal of Literature and Arts, 12(1), 8-15. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20241201.12

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    ACS Style

    Xiaofang, S. Spiritual Disorientation: A Study of Place in Linda Hogan’s Solar Storms from the Perspective of Human Geography. Int. J. Lit. Arts 2024, 12(1), 8-15. doi: 10.11648/j.ijla.20241201.12

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    AMA Style

    Xiaofang S. Spiritual Disorientation: A Study of Place in Linda Hogan’s Solar Storms from the Perspective of Human Geography. Int J Lit Arts. 2024;12(1):8-15. doi: 10.11648/j.ijla.20241201.12

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  • @article{10.11648/j.ijla.20241201.12,
      author = {Sun Xiaofang},
      title = {Spiritual Disorientation: A Study of Place in Linda Hogan’s Solar Storms from the Perspective of Human Geography},
      journal = {International Journal of Literature and Arts},
      volume = {12},
      number = {1},
      pages = {8-15},
      doi = {10.11648/j.ijla.20241201.12},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20241201.12},
      eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ijla.20241201.12},
      abstract = {Linda Hogan is a Chickasaw writer grown up in the Native American Renaissance, who feels much obliged to figure out an effective way of guiding the colonized native people out of ecocide and ethnocide wrought by the Euro-American colonization. As an author wholly drenched in the indigenous cosmology, Hogan bestows great concern on the issue of place in the literary creation, which is a pivotal cosmological element in the native epistemological system and thus can be taken as a means for her to decolonize her people. This paper is to investigate the issue of colonization and decolonization through the lens of place in the register of human geography by exploring the spiritual disorientation attributed to land loss represented in her novel Solar Storms (1995). Based on detailed textual analysis, it is unfolded that the spiritual disorientation in the Indian community has been overtly embodied in two aspects: native men’s alcoholism and their conceding to white masculinity, and child abuse conducted by women for their suffering from intergenerational trauma, which truly represents the mental or psychological crisis of indigenous peoples triggered by and attendant to the land loss. In conclusion, the decolonizing process in Hogan’s fiction necessitates reviewing the horrible outcome of the native people’s land loss history so as to enhance their recognition of the communal place, stimulate their sense of community and develop new sites and strategies of resistance.
    },
     year = {2024}
    }
    

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    AB  - Linda Hogan is a Chickasaw writer grown up in the Native American Renaissance, who feels much obliged to figure out an effective way of guiding the colonized native people out of ecocide and ethnocide wrought by the Euro-American colonization. As an author wholly drenched in the indigenous cosmology, Hogan bestows great concern on the issue of place in the literary creation, which is a pivotal cosmological element in the native epistemological system and thus can be taken as a means for her to decolonize her people. This paper is to investigate the issue of colonization and decolonization through the lens of place in the register of human geography by exploring the spiritual disorientation attributed to land loss represented in her novel Solar Storms (1995). Based on detailed textual analysis, it is unfolded that the spiritual disorientation in the Indian community has been overtly embodied in two aspects: native men’s alcoholism and their conceding to white masculinity, and child abuse conducted by women for their suffering from intergenerational trauma, which truly represents the mental or psychological crisis of indigenous peoples triggered by and attendant to the land loss. In conclusion, the decolonizing process in Hogan’s fiction necessitates reviewing the horrible outcome of the native people’s land loss history so as to enhance their recognition of the communal place, stimulate their sense of community and develop new sites and strategies of resistance.
    
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Author Information
  • School of Foreign Languages and Business, Shenzhen Polytechnic University, Shenzhen, China

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