Ella Cara Deloria

THEORY

“She wrote classic texts on Dakota language, public policy studies, ethnographic accounts of Dakota life in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and a novel, Waterlily, the poignant story of Dakota life told from the perspective of women’s experiences.” (Finn 2000, 158-9)

“As Ella Deloria mediated between cultural boundaries, she contributed both explanations of the differences between cultures and illustrations of the similarities. Her book SPEAKING OF INDIANS explains some of the differences between the two foci of her cultural roots. Her fictional ethnography, WATERLILY…illustrates similarities between cultures by presenting an image of the Sioux that is uniquely familiar to individuals from the dominant culture.” (Prater 1995, pg 40)