Connecting Human and Nature: Storytelling in Silko’s Yellow Woman and a Beauty of the Spirit

Abstract

Leslie Marmon Silko returns repeatedly to the ties of the people to the nature. Her explorations of Pueblo myths, prophecies and storytelling emphasize the inextricable links between human identity, imagination and Mother Earth. This thesis examines the interrelationship between the Nature, Narrative and Native American Identity in her collection Yellow Woman and a Beauty of the Spirit through the path of Storytelling. In her writing, Pueblo identity intertwines with the inner strands of storytelling and its functional importance to the maintenance of traditional Native culture. All unite at the center – the land or Mother Earth, the single spirit out of which the entire Universe with its objects is emanated.