>> linda hogan, in your pulitzer nominated book mean spirit, whose grace? your character grace? >> guest: grace is the character who was murdered at the beginning of the book. a pulitzer finalist that year. not a nominee. the pulitzer was won by john updike. so i lost to john updike. that is probably a given. grace is the person who began the book. who began the book. this is based on -- "mean spirit" is based on the oil boom in oklahoma and basically a true story with fictional characters woven in. it is about what happened during the oil boom. the non indian men came into the area to become oil wealthy and found they could do so by marion women. and receiving their land because they were men. they could become owners of the land. so they often, in certain areas, were guilty of killing women. eagle of killing their own children to have the land. the world was a very greedy place at times, most of the times it seems these days. the fbi formed around this. the fbi story, the movie has that in it. so they sent in one native man. i created the character of red hawk to be the fbi informant. and he's actually from -- he's a lakota. but i also discovered later that an indian writer named gertrude and discovered an american woman was and in real life, she is a writer and wrote several wonderful books at the turn of the century and started a magazine which has until -- maybe it is still in print with carlos montezuma. they were activists at the time. >> host: what was it about the 1920s that had you writing historical fiction? >> guest: stories from my family primarily. oral traditions. not oral traditions so much as stories. i had a woman from new york who was an actress. she wanted me to write a script for her to be in. so it started as a script and ended up as a novel because we couldn't figure out what to do with the script. so i added to it and expanded it. i had never written a novel before or studied fiction. i had to teach myself how to write fiction. it was kind of a complicated thing to do. ira would look at someone who was really good fiction writer and compare their paragraph with my paragraph and see what was lacking in mind and think i could add this or do this. so it was a practice i still keep doing when i am writing fiction. >> host: who do you compare yourself to? >> depends on what book have read recently. am amazed by. sometimes i'll look at -- one of the things, i think, with she went from being a best-selling author which doesn't necessarily mean you are a great writer to being a great writer. just a literary -- masterpiece. then i read a book called cellophane and i have forgotten the author but i look at that one now. i am writing about community, a few people who come from a fern forest on an island. so i do research and i read books that are set in rainforests places. and i look at what is in there. i do a lot of work over there, a piece of work that i do. then i am working on a book for the tribe for the chickasaw nation which is also requiring a lot of research and travel to the southeast. very few people understand or know much about southeast -- those of us who have been removed and why our cultures are different than the ones that are stereotyped like navajo, lakota, most non indian americans think indian they think of a certain kind of -- people. they don't really think about people who lost their homeland or been forced from them. they think of people who are still there. >> host: as a self identified indian writer, what is the definition of that? >> guest: i am not release of identified. i am tribally identified. it runs in the family. i write about what our difficulties are. i write about political situations that are going awry like the quebec project where they decided to moved hydro-quebec -- decided to move the st. lawrence river and killed many care of do --cari u --caribou. people who had to fight that project. then i write about in my essay, i take many different issues. right now i am writing about states that are very small, including what we think are there but have seen and what they can do to people. i usually select a political topic with power. i wrote about the florida panther which is a very endangered species. and lived in an extremely toxic environment and so is still as are all the creatures in the everglades because of the agricultural runoff and other difficulties. and so i based it on a true story because the killing of a florida panther, i went to the everglades and stayed with the biologist steve jensen who is the wildlife biologist for florida panthers and i did research in the courthouse on the case which was pretty cut and dried if they had to tell the truth what would happen would have been over. but the case went on for four years with much conflict between environmentalists and tribes and numerous people fighting for different reasons. >> host: who are the chickasaw indians and where do they live? >> guest: well, who are the chickasaw indians? we have been around for centuries and centuries and centuries and we are from the southeast, mississippi, tennessee. i just came from repatriation. i call it a remake creation in kentucky. some of our remains from the past, we came from the mississippiands, the builders of cahokia and many other mounds. an incredibly complex culture. in the past. we then were removed because of andrew jackson's policies and corruption. and ended up in oklahoma which was indian territory. and oklahoma is from our word meaning red people. the united states government wanted to build a wall around oklahoma and place all the indian people of america inside of it. of this continent. the idea was to keep everyone from going out so the oil could belong to white americans and immigrants and people coming in who wanted to farm. in fact, black kettle's band was chased across kansas so often, hero of the land of goodland kansas. but we ended up in the area around southeastern oklahoma and we are still there. we survive a civil war, and land graft and corruption and the dog act which was giving us allotments, what happened on the white earth reservation in minnesota and numerous other places. so we lost our reservations system. in that way lost our land. we survived -- i always wonder why all of our guys really like the suitors. doesn't anyone think about what the word means? >> host: what does it mean? >> guest: they assumed the oklahoma land rush into the country of oklahoma. >> host: early 20th century? >> guest: i am trying to think of the year. it would have been around just before that, the end of the nineteenth century. i always feel i grew up in the nineteenth century. i also get 1900s and 2,000s. when i talk about the 1700s i call it the seventeenth century. i have to be careful. we went from poverty, especially when i was a girl that poverty was really intense. we had a difficult life as a tribal nation into being economically stable. we now are doing really quite well. we have all categories of people who make different incomes so i can't say everybody is doing great. basically economically the tribal nation is doing really well and has scholarships for students in school. >> host: back to the original question, what are sooners? >> guest: people who wanted to get in the sitter and claim land. the land belonged to the indian people. >> host: in your book "the woman who watches over the world," you write i have concluded over the years that the two ways native and europeans are almost impossible to intertwine, they are parallel worlds taking place at the same time, bridges only sometimes made allowing for a meeting place of lies. lives. >> guest: there are different ways of knowledge. i have been around so many different tribal nations that i understand many different ways of understanding the world according to even the languages, the ecosystems of the people. they have a great amount of knowledge and understanding even in the language. it is very significant to us to realized we have our own astronomy for instance. we have different ways of knowing the world and understanding and seeing the world. than the majority of the dominant culture's. western minds. and so one of the things i have been working with for many years with different groups is the western mind and that native mind together, not just one native mind. i once said i know how i think, or how some of us chickasaws think but i don't have no power and apache thinks. i can't say i would know that. someone send me a question somee a question and the apache philosopher has a book and we would like to know if you would like to -- we want to know if you want to write the introduction. i will have an inkling of how and apache thanks. we are not all alike. we do have our and astronomy. we have our own languages. it makes for a very interesting mix. but it is not always the western mind. when you read a history book they are usually written by non indians and they are usually from a western lands. history seen through the western point of view. which is why i am working on the project i am now. which is history, archaeology, our world scene from an indigenous point of view. >> host: where were you raised? >> guest: i was raised in colorado, in oklahoma, in germany. i don't know. my father was in the military. we lived in colorado springs. he retired to colorado springs when i was 15 and after that, i graduated -- i went to high school for two years and moved to oregon. then i continued to raise myself all over. >> host: tell us about your parents. >> guest: what would you like to know? >> host: who were they? >> guest: my mother was from nebraska from a farm family that moved into the city so i never knew them on the farm but i knew the farmer. i didn't know that family very intimately or well, i have cousins that i'm at. i met. my father's family has always been a very close family. we would always return to oklahoma for a reunion and to visit his family and his parents and we would all go together and i had cousins and we would spend our time together and i felt very much like that was my home. i always felt that was my home. >> host: your father is chickasaw and your mother is pennsylvania dutch. when did you start writing? >> guest: i didn't start writing until i was in my late 20s, maybe 28. >> host: y? >> guest: i was married at the time. i read my first book of contemporary poetry. i didn't know there was such a thing. it was such magic. first, the first poem i read was about a cow and i thought what do i know about cows? i could write something about a cow. the man and i started trying to write in a contemporary way, the minute i knew it was this magical experience, there was a feeling that i had never had before. and i loved it. i wanted to do it more. and i still feel like that. i wrote today before i came here. i just get up in the morning and that is what i want to do. i want to write. and the date that i have to go to work to my office i feel deprived of my real work. i feel deprived of writing. it is what i really love. there is a magic to it. there's something to with that i can't tell you. you hear it sometimes or you see it or you feel it and it just has to be said. in the right way. >> host: as the chickasaw nation writer in residence what do you do? >> guest: i do classes sometimes. i teach creative writing now and then in some of these smaller -- i worked with the chickasaw girls, the chickasaw children's home. it was a wonderful -- it was the highlight of my life. they were absolutely adorable and wonderful and they did incredible work. and they had relatives. they remembered their great grandparents and grandparents and i was figuring out time periods that they were riding and i didn't ask them to write. they just did. they have a lot of freedom. two of them had relatives that hid bonnie and clyde from the police. they didn't really know anything about bonnie and clyde but they knew the police were dangerous. so they helped hide them but then the police chased them and they both wrote about that. it made such an impact on their lives. another one had a grandfather that started the american indian movement. one of the originators of the american indian movement. so it was exciting. so i taught that class, and others, adults, and where i lived, and underserved community. i also have written the performance -- and amazing performance that was put on a i think for the first time last year and we are working on sending it out on the road. it should be at the kennedy center. i couldn't believe it turned out so good. it was amazing. it had dancing in it, singing, our plans. by cousin margaret wheeler did many of the designs and costumes. she is a professional weaver and she does traditional weaving. jerrod kate was performer of the music. it was a great asset. the dance was amazing. the feeling and emotion, everyone that saw it came away moved and touched by it. that is one of the things i did. i wrote a children's book for arts and humanities. which is one of our stories for children. it is a bilingual book. >> host: tiexiera! is capital of the chickasaw nation. how does it work to have the chickasaw nation with an oklahoma. what are the politics and so on? >> guest: i am not sure i know what you mean how does it work? >> host: is it another government laid? does it report to the state of oklahoma? how much autonomy? >> guest: we are a sovereign nation. >> host: so do you -- does that mean that -- do you have to follow the laws of oklahoma since you are contained within the state of oklahoma? >> guest: i wouldn't want to break them. i did get a ticket. i had to pay it. i am not a citizen. >> host: how does that work with a sovereign nation? >> guest: we have the ability to make treaties with the government. we have the ability to negotiate with other governments if we want to. we have the ability to be a country, our own country and make our own decisions. and so that is basically how it works to be a sovereign nation. we are a country. we are our own nation. >> host: why did you call your memoir "the woman who watches over the world"? >> guest: it is based on this beautiful folklore -- folk art piece that i bought. in the museum in california at a folk art museum and it was a woman sort of flying and she had the earth in her hand. you could see the outline of the united states and south america and some of the other continents on it. i fell in love with her. i love folk art. a lot of it is clay. it is not fired and it is fragile. when she arrived -- they knew i would break it through my luggage. when it arrived, i believe her legs were broken off. later another part broke off. and i thought about how it is so like our world. it is breaking. we need so much to protect it. and so i still have her and she is still broken. i haven't tried to. her back together --glue her back together. part of my work is not only to work for my own people but to also work for the whole world, for every living thing on earth. i care about that. it matters to me. it matters to me more than anything. so i wanted to be about someone who is watching over the world. looking after the world. karen for it. observing. >> host: in your 1995 book "dwellings: a spiritual history of the living world," you right here is a lesson, what happens to people and what happens to the land is the same vein. >> guest: yes. what happens to the land also happens to the people. to the people. for instance, i watch rancher poison feeder trees without realizing -- without thinking ahead to what happens when you put poison on the trees. that poison goes into the water. it may kill the trees that put that in your water supply. so we are connected to everything. we have to be careful about what we do and the effects of it in the future. so what happens to the land, what we do to the land affects us. the lead of six nations talk about being careful for the next seven generations. but in my opinion we need to get further than seven generations. we need to think far into the future. >> host: what is eco feminism? >> guest: i have no idea what that is. i am called that. there are conferences where they talk about my books on pico feminism. the only thing i can think of is the idea that the body of the woman and the body of the earth are very similar and when women speak out for the earth somehow it becomes eco feminism. i don't know exactly. but i know that one of the problems academically that i had -- have had is i think of race and class first in my life and i think of being a woman a little later down the line because race and class, class is such an issue. people who live in poverty, poverty is more of an issue far me than being of feet -- female. cowher mail i would have a different life. i realize that as i get older. i would probably have more sales with my books than being a female. it took me a long time to think about that. >> host: in "the woman who watches over the world" view quote a poem or an essay for giving us the horse we can almost forgive the alcohol. almost. >> guest: that is a poem from a friend of mine who passed away. >> host: what does that mean? >> guest: the course became a sacred animal everywhere. the names for the worse -- horse were whollyhorse -- horse were wholly elk and sacred dog. is valuable and useful and the only thing from european culture that has entered into the methodology of tribal nations. there are horse songs, there are horseythology of tribal nations. horse stories, horse myths. the navajo have a beautiful the navajo have a beautiful -- i don't know -- i would almost call up for air for the horse, the lightning main, just this beautiful, long road to the horse that i love. i would actually like to work with a book on indian horses because most are northern plains and don't take in southeastern and we had our own breed of pony, the chickasaw horse which is what my is. >> host: at you are a writer. >> guest: i am a writer. [talking over each other] >> guest: i am not a writer and the lager. i had an accident. i had an accident. >> host: what happened? >> guest: i had a brain injury. i had numerous other injuries. my body is older now. i am a little more fragile. i just can't afford to have another accident. even my horse is a very short. whenever she has decided she doesn't want me on her it is easy to get off. she can just slide me off if she wants to. she is a mistake who has some habits. when i first had her i was fighting her and i was going -- she was in a large pasture with 72 acres and i was with some friends and we were writing after of the horses. she just laid down with me on her. i got off. the other woman with me said that is the evil pony routine. never get off. then when they stand back up you are in the right spot. so i don't ride. >> host: what was the effect of the accident you had? >> guest: i had a brain injury. i lost my home. i lost my job at the university of colorado for a while. i went back later. but i had memory loss. i had to do cognitive therapy. i don't remember the accident. i don't remember a lot of things. i can work on my book, i can remember everything i am working on. there are just select areas of my brain that are not full, that are not hold. making the same connections that they need to make. but i am forming new ones all the time. we always do. so i think writing helped me form new ones. i kept writing the whole time that i could while i was recovering. i had three for actors in my pelvis too. i spent a lot of time before i could get around very much, writing time. anyway, i still have some short-term memory problems. one of my friends recently said you have asked me the same question or told me the same thing several times. i usually don't talk about brain injury but i had to tell her i had an accident. i don't always remember. i just pretend like i remember everything and i am friendly to people i don't know because i think i probably do know them. i survived it. >> host: good afternoon and welcome to booktv's in depth program. we are talking with linda hogan who is our guest this month. this is a program where each month we feature one author and his or her body of work so we get to know that offer a little bit and take your calls and questions and e-mails and tweets. if you would like to call in and talk with a native american writer and pulitzer finalist linda hogan, 202-624-1111. if you're in the east and central time zone it is 1115. in the mountain and pacific time zone. send an e-mail at booktv@c-span.org or you can send us a tweet at booktv is our handle, twitter.com/booktv. let's go back to for giving us the horse we could almost forgive the alcohol. let's go to the second part. we can almost forgive the alcohol. >> guest: alcohol is very destructive to the tribes. it was supposed to be. it was manipulation. we had many manipulations. we had to deal with. for us, they started early. in the sixteenth century, we were having to deal with the slave trade which indian people on the other side of the mississippi never had to think about. we were being sold into the caribbean for sugar plantation slavery. so were other tribes. we had to figure out how to get weapons. also alcohol was destroying people. and so we have laws against bringing in alcohol but of course the laws were violated. we did not want it because of the destruction of people. but also, part of post-traumatic stress syndrome that people still have, indian people still at if. the use of alcohol is still prevalent in some regions because the people are in the process of de colonizing themselves but it is a difficult process. sometimes it is just easier for someone to give up. and drink, i think. i have watched people have difficult lives and spend money on alcohol and ruined families. i have watched it ruined families. but i think part of -- there is the reason why people use it and part of it is the pain. it is a way of killing pain. >> host: are native americans marginalized today? are the invisible as the right? >> guest: you are and where you live. or you mean as you right? >> host: as you have written in your books and in your essays. >> guest: i think yes. i have to say yes. to be consistent with my book's message. there is -- there is still racism. there is still conflict between native societies and america at large. i think about the snowball in flagstaff for instance, building a ski area on the sacred mountain that has been one of the places of origin, one of the landmarks of many tribes, not just the navajo. in flagstaff. and not only that but defacing it by using human waste and recycling it to make snow for people to ski on. there was a big conflict over it. the lack of understanding of what is sacred was shown when the forest service said exactly where is the line where the mountain ceases to be sacred? as if there is a spot where you can say this is sacred and this is not so sacred. so yes. we are still marginalized. >> host: when it comes to policy what influence to american -- native americans have in washington? >> guest: not enough. not enough. >> host: linda hogan is our guest at our first call is from greg in cleveland. you are on booktv. >> caller: hi, linda. part of my question is a comment. it has to do with the political side. i really feel that americans have a tremendous burden of guilt for the way we decimated the natives. i think the americans are far worse than hitler ever was. why do you think the black people have more political strength than the native is do? and they are able to seemingly bring themselves more up in the western society? >> guest: there are a lot of things to respond to in your comment and your question. america has been at war forever and we continue to be. we have a history of destruction in this country. it has been on going. so i have to agree in part with your question. the second part is i think the historical process has been more difficult for indian people and also we are more invisible. you notice whenever you read the newspaper they will say asian, black, latino, and that is it. natives are never mentioned or if there is an article about american indian people, it will be in the past tense as if we no longer exist. and i think that is why the black presence is stronger. it is a historical process. >> host: what is the difference between a sovereign nation, chickasaw nation and the reservations system? >> guest: all of the tribes are sovereign nations. we have a lot month where some have reservations. the allotments were created to break up tribal nations. it didn't work. but families were separated. according to land. land allotments were given. they were assigned in different areas. there were checkerboards. they call it a checkerboard plan which was to give people land here and someone else when and over here to break a political power and tribalism. >> host: next call from paul in kentucky. >> caller: thank you. it is a pleasure to speak with you, linda. >> guest: how is kentucky doing with that water? >> caller: we are fighting the good fight here against the strip mining and mountaintop removal of coal fields. but it is not going real well. my question has to do with the presence at the present time of native people's not just in america but all over the world. a lot of times we think of indians we just think about indians in the u.s. but there are native indigenous people that are being eve this r-rated all over the world. india has been axles which are being hunted down, you have native indians in brazil. even in afghanistan they call the areas where they're doing all the bombing the tribal areas. i want you to speak to the fact that indigenous people around the world are being if under attack. er attack. and is there some way we can get this out into the press so they can understand that this should be stopped immediately? >> guest: well, what you're saying was true. >> guest: what you are saying is true. i was just in norway and the performance with a nsga woman in india under attack by the burmese. i think what it is, there's always the land hunger and indigenous people are vulnerable. there are resources that others want. for instance, in i think it is coaster rica, covered the land and animals and oil. so what we think about is the oil in the gulf. we don't realize that is happening in other regions as well. it should be published. it should be in papers. it is very difficult to have that information. one book that i read was by hawkins. i am sure you remember him from long ago. or maybe not. the same thing is going on -- in a way it is not just indigenous people that are under attack. talking about mountaintop removal. the assault on the land, it is the same thing. you are under attack in other areas. and your water -- the water is being ruined. the land is being ruined and it will never be back. it will never be the same. we have to be ever vigilant about what is happening which is why i said early on i pay attention to the small things that will affect the future many years from now because once something is gone it will never return. and the wars against tribes are ongoing and they are violent and they are built on greed and the idea of power. my idea of power is to take care of people. having the power and the money to take care of people. in stead of buying and purchasing mansions or more than ten houses or whenever people do with a lot of their money, if they had real power they would be taking care of people in the world. why aren't they? are they happy? we need to think about that with all of the companies that are doing the destruction that they are and all of the people who are attacking others for their land base. >> host: next call is from north carolina. ronny, you are on the line. >> caller: pleasure to speak with you. i am -- you know about the arawak indians. i was there originally -- [inaudible] [talking over each other] >> host: we can't make of your words. if you could call back and see if there's a different connection that can be made or call on a hard line. huntington, kentucky. nancy, you are on booktv. >> caller: i would like to ask you a question. i have tried several times to call the indian nation and they give me bogus numbers. i can never find any place close to me to hook up with my culture. i don't know why this is. i live in kentucky close to a high of. way up in ohio or oklahoma, i can't get to those places. how can i join the culture? >> guest: what nation are you from? >> caller: same as you. >> guest: you are chickasaw? go on chickasaw.net online and we will hook you up. there are also fun numbers. >> caller: >> guest: >> host: that caller's gone. in "mean spirit," what is on the cover of this book? >> guest: no one is asking me writing questions. >> host: what is on the cover of this book? >> guest: i don't know. i don't do the covers. i pick the 0 regional and the hardcover and it was a painting by billy rabbit that i really loved. i didn't have any choice in this. there is a car, a fancy car and a tp which doesn't fit the area. it would have been a house. >> host: what is an encampment? you write about indian encampments in this book and in some of your essays. >> guest: in those books, in my novels, the encampments aren't so much like a camp or encampment. they are regions where the traditional people still live. and the traditional people who are the knowledge holders are in one region and so they are visited by others. they are the elders or the people who have the most knowledge and who are filled with wisdom. no ceremonies. remember, remember memory, you know? and so there are actually places where people live. i would say my idea of an encampment in the 70s at wounded knee or something like that. i am that short -- not sure what you mean by encampment in as a. >> host: next call from new york. >> caller: hi, linda. we have a problem with taxation in new york. our governors have said if we could only get our hands on indian cigarette money we could close our tax gap. i was wondering if your nation has the same problem. with your state trying to tax you on sovereign money? >> guest: not that i know of but don't pay much attention to cigarette tax. oklahoma has a large population of native people. that is one of the ways we educate and pay for education and make a living to build our health clinics. i don't think we have the same problem you might have in new york. >> host: albany, oregon. go ahead with your question or comment. >> caller: i have heard you speak a couple times at oregon state university and thank you for coming to visit. my question today is i become acutely aware of the difference between american history and u.s. history which most people seem to think american history started in 1492. what happened to history in 1491 and before? i appreciate you said there was a bridge -- between the cultures. i am interested somehow in learning to breach that. some way through the legal process or awareness of the legal process it has been quite an interesting history. there were some interesting books on the history -- [inaudible] -- so your comments please. thank you. >> guest: history begins in some places 50,000 years ago. there has been a long and ongoing tradition of change and response to environment like earthquakes, floods and different kinds of things. i found ways that i can uncover that to put many histories together. i look at different histories and find what seems like the truth in it. also the way is to bridge that are really just to read american indian literature, essays, politics, history, by indigenous people themselves, and see what the fthoughts are like that are different than a different from any other thoughts. the anyone going to ask about writing? >> host: what would you like to be asked about writing? >> guest: anything. i am interested in the political questions, that is all right too. >> host: your most recent book, people of the whale:a novel. you spend a lot of time writing about the notion. >> i don't know why i don't live on the ocean. [talking over each other] >> guest: i love the ocean. i have been thinking i haven't seen the ocean in a while and domestic. actually had -- . and i, brendra peterson did a book for national geographic on wales and people in the whaling community that was people in a wailing community that was preparing to wail. some of the elders came to interview them because they were against with their tribal council -- i followed the gray whales. we followed them and went to different tribal communities up and down the coast and i fell in love with dolphins and whales and sea mammals. so the book is fiction but it is based on events that did take place. it is not exactly what everyone thinks it is. our was just at a conference where someone was talking about my work and one woman said linda hogan is for and against wailing and i thought that is a really interesting way of looking at it. in the book, main character goes home because he believes there will be a return to tradition. he is disappointed when he finds out his people are involved in a business proposition. i right about the ocean because it is a great power. power. our life -- i mean, we're made it is our life. we are made of practically the same amount of salt water in our bodies. it has mystery. it is full of life. even the plankton is fascinating. the fact for me that the great whale are landlocked and have to stay close to land because they have to have their plankton. and has to be photos synthesized for them to have health. that is amazing. and too they were very friendly with us. when we were in the birthing lagoon, last place you expect them to be friendly the mother's brother babies on the backs to show us their children or they would come and lift our skiff in the air from underneath so we would not be in the water but would be on top of the whale. anyway i fell in love with the ocean and with being in the ocean and kayaking with whales and having experiences that seemed beyond imagination. >> host: next call for linda hogan from cleveland, of ohio. go ahead with your question. >> guest: ocean city. >> caller: hello. >> host: please go ahead. >> caller: can you hear me? >> guest: please go ahead. >> caller: pertaining to politics, sorry. pertaining to the racist logo in popular society. we have been protesting to get rid of this low go far for several years since the 20s and they continue to disrespect popular society is only interested in cash and disrespect to the people. >> host: you talking about sports logos like the washington redskins and cleveland indians?