| Summary: | In this dissertation, I create an interpretive framework based on deictic constructions to analyze Dene/Athabaskan poetics in four print collections of dual-language textualized orature— Denesułine/Chipewyan (Alberta), Dena’ina/Tanaina (Alaska), Dene Dháh/South Slavey (Alberta), and Diné Bizaad/Navajo (Southwest). Using this framework, I focus on the epistemological power of animals via the critical metaphor of animal tissue (muscle, bone, blood, and breath)—thus “histology.” My Introduction describes my framework. Chapter two, “‘Grandson, / This is meat’: Wolf and Caribou on How to Live in This Is What They Say,” focuses on ɂɛtθén, the word for both “meat” and “caribou,” and the homophonic relationship between meat and caribou. Chapter three, “‘I will be popular with the Campfire People, so ha, ha, ha’: Porcupine and Lynx on How to Love in K’tl’egh’i Sukdu/A Dena’ina Legacy,” on k’etch eltani, the prophetic practice of true belief. Chapter four, “‘What will you do now?’: Wolverine and Wolf on How to Die in ‘The Man Who Sought a Song,’” told by Elisse Ahnassay, on the (a)historical function of wodih, “news,” an oral genre that shapes the future. Chapter five, “‘If it floats, we will all live forever’: Coyote and Badger on How to Live Again in Diné Bahane’: The Navajo Creation Story,” on the reincarnational exchange figured by niłch’i bii’ sizinii, the inner wind. My Conclusion, “Histologies,” considers how the above concepts correspond to: flesh (ɂɛtθén), mind (k’etch eltani), breath (niłch’i bii’ sizinii), and bone (wodih): an animal that is a dream, a dream that is an animal. One of the primary ideas in my dissertation is the concept of narrative revitalization, which I define as cognate to and coeval with community practices of language revitalization, by comparing our conditions for who we are, how much space we believe ourselves to share, and how much time we have to share it in. Arts, Faculty of English, Department of Graduate
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