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Ernestine Hayes. Blonde Indian: An Alaska Native Memoir. Sun Tracks: An American Indian Literary Series. Tucson: U of Arizona P, 2006. ISBN: 0-8165-2537-4. 173 pp.
With her opening words, Ernestine Hayes informs readers that she will tell her story in a fashion that honors her ancestors and Tlingit oral tradition. She begins in her native language - the book's first printed words are "haa shagoon" ("our ancestors") - and gives her Tlingit name, Saankaláxt, before her "white man name." She proceeds to recount her ancestry, establishing both her right to speak as a Tlingit woman and her connection to the land: "We belong to Lingít Aaní" (n. pag.). It is a traditional beginning to what has become, sadly, a traditional story: Native families damaged by assimilationist policies and alcohol abuse. Yet Hayes offers a hopeful narrative of returning home to the land that will always embrace its people.
The daughter of a Lingít woman and a white man, Hayes grew up in the Indian Village in Juneau, Alaska, before moving with her mother to California. She spent her earliest years being raised by her grandmother and her aunt while her mother was treated for tuberculosis. Hayes, who began abusing alcohol as a teenager, describes a life of hardship that includes relationships with abusive men, estrangement from her children, and extended periods of homelessness. Through it all, the idea of returning to Alaska sustains her. The land itself, consistently represented not only as the singular shaping force of her culture but also as part of her family, signifies redemption for Hayes.
Hayes divides her memoir into four sections, each introduced by a traditional story; every section includes not only details of Hayes's life...