American Indian Culture and Research Journal

In our exploration of the nature of Native American literature, we have customarily drawn the distinction between the major oral forms such as oral narratives, song-poetry, and oratory, and the written forms of the novel, the short story, and poetry. In doing so, we have not meant to imply that the oral forms are examples of tribal heritages that have vanished, and that the written forms have supplanted them in the same soil, only quite assimilated, only 20th Century. On the contrary, the oral tradition continues with considerable vigor, albeit less central to the fabric of Native American life, and with some shifting from the oral to the written. One specific written form of Native American literary expression, which will be termed "bi-autobiography," blends both the features of the oral and written modes. To be sure, other written works by 20th Century Native American authors in some way reflect oral tribal traditions, sometimes confirming them, sometimes fleeing to them, sometimes transcending them. Yet, Native American bi-autobiography stands apart from these other Native American written forms in its greater adherence to the stance and the flavor of oral narrative while, at the same time, permitting necessary adjustments to the literary market and our literary conventions. The understanding and appreciation of bi-autobiography, I contend, hinges upon an awareness of the collaborative venture which has brought it forth. Moreover, even the familiarity with only a limited number of bi-autobiographies should impress us with the significant and unique role the introductions play in elucidating the nature of the specific collaboration involved in the life stories which follow them.