Living the Spirit: A Gay American Indian Anthology (Stonewall Inn Editions (Paperback))

Rating:
Summary: An amazing look at how we robbed America of its queerness.
Review: This incredible book is a compilation of essays, stories, poems, and biographical accounts of living as a gay, bisexual, transsexual, or hermaphrodite American-Indian (all which have been lumped under the term 'berdache'). This book not only deals with the history of American Indians, and how they embraced the non-heterosexual members of their society as healers, but shows how, with the creation of the New World, the English made American-Indians turn against their own, converting their religion, and, in turn, converting them into a homophobic subculture. Finally, there are wonderful accounts of living in modern society as a gay American-Indian, and the scorn these people receive. This is an eye-opening and disturbing book that really gives us a better understanding of all the things we took from American-Indians.