American Indian Culture and Research Journal

In decolonization, there is the need of a complete calling in question of the colonial situation. If we wish to describe it precisely, we might find it in the well-known words: “The last shall be first and the first last.” Decolonization is the putting into practice of this sentence. That is why, if we try to describe it, all decolonization is successful. —Frantz Fanon, Wretched of the Earth Anishinaabe politician, author, and activist Winona LaDuke is one of the most recognizable tribal figures in modern America. Attaining minor fame as Ralph Nader’s vice-presidential candidate on the Green Party ticket in 1996 and 2000, LaDuke has often been assigned the role of Native spokesperson by non-Natives in both mainstream and leftist media. The attention given LaDuke is focused overwhelmingly on her land reclamation and environmental work, which are detailed in All Our Relations: Native Struggles for Land and Life. Although LaDuke’s status as a notable Indian is well established among non-Indian Americans, it is considerably more nebulous within Native Studies itself. Also, despite—or perhaps because of—her notoriety as an activist and environmentalist, LaDuke’s work as a novelist has gone virtually unnoticed by either American or Native critics. Only a handful of reviews met the publication of her 1997 novel, Last Standing Woman, which has received scant critical attention. This essay attempts to address that deficit by looking in detail at Last Standing Woman, placing emphasis on the interplay between white settlers and indigenous Anishinaabeg. While the multivocal, nonlinear structure in Last Standing Woman has been employed often in Native letters—and, more specifically, in the fiction of LaDuke’s Anishinaabe contemporary Louise Erdrich—the novel offers readers and scholars valuable textual features for consumption and critique. One difficulty of examining the book, in fact, lies in the wide range of themes LaDuke presents: religious, feminist, activist, environmental, tribal, historical, colonial, decolonial, postcolonial, biographical, autobiographical. This ambitious groundwork, coupled with the large number of characters in the book, challenges the reader and complicates the task of the critic. It is clear that when setting out to construct her first novel, LaDuke intended to avoid the comforts of conventional fictive expression by representing myriad voices in as many contexts as the scope of the project could accommodate.