UC San Diego

ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION

W/riting Indigeneity; Circularities through the Codices of the Native Body by Sam Aros Mitchell

Doctor of Philosophy in Drama and Theatre

University of California San Diego, 2021 University of California Irvine, 2021

Professor Julie Burelle, Chair

This dissertation interweaves plays, performances, writings and dances created by Native artists and scholars within the context of Indigenous sovereignty, Indigenous practices and Indigenous relationships. As these works circulate through actual and (textual) bodies, I attend to the necessary act of (re)-writing/(re)-rite-ing Native histories and memories from an Indigenous perspective.

I draw inspiration and am informed by the process extended by the founders of Spiderwoman Theater known as “storyweaving”. Founded in 1976, the group was started by Muriel Miguel, Gloria Miguel (sisters) and Lisa Mayo. Drawing their name from the Hopi creation story known as Spider Grandmother, (Phoebe 93), Spiderwoman Theater emerged as one of the first as an Indigenous contemporary women's theater group. According to the Hopi creation story, Spider Grandmother, or "Gogyeng Sowuhti" was the guide for all the creatures, who moved through several worlds, learning more and more about those worlds until they could eventually move to the highest realm, the fourth world (Courlander 32). By writing from the center to the edge, this dissertation weaves and connects the legibility of the Native body between land and constellations, between story and body. Despite settler colonialism’s multiple attempts to extrapolate the intellectual and spiritual resources of the Indigenous, we stand steadfast in our sovereignty and our right to refuse those extractions. The model for outlining this project is based on the Native American Medicine Wheel, which serves as my guide rather than the commonly formal outline model dictated by the Western academy.