My Heart is on the Ground: The Diary of Nannie Little Rose, a Sioux Girl (Dear America)

Rating:
Summary: Whata great book!
Review: I just reciently read this book and I thought it was great. I think the author must be really good because in some parts of the book, I almost wanted to cry (and that usually doesn't happen very easily!). All in all, I think this is a very good, well-writen and thought through book and it is well worth reading! *~Katy~*

Rating:
Summary: Exellent, savory, brillant!
Review: My Heart is on the Ground is a wonderful story of the confusion of going to a Indian boarding school. I think that it must have been quite confusing to go far away from your home, wear clothes that are seemingly way to long, having your long hair cut, (A symbol of sorrow) and having your best friend die. It is a wonderful book!

Rating:
Summary: My Heart is On the Ground: A Touching Story
Review: My mother and I read this book together for a book group and thought it was very touching. I never new about this time in history before! It is about a young Sioux girl (Nannie Little Rose) who is told by her father that she has to do an act of bravery. She doesn't understand what type of bravery could happen where she is--a whiteman's boarding school. The story is about how the Indians are treated there and how they adjust to this totally different way of life. I really enjoyed the book and would reconmend it to girls 9-14 years old. I am 12. I must warn you that it is very disturbing, especially in the end. Still, I think it is a must read!

Rating:
Summary: disrespectful fiction
Review: The author of, My Heart is on the Ground, has confused her cultural beliefs and values with the Lakota people's. She needs to do more research and show the true ways of the Lakota & not her vague perception of a tragic time for many Native American children.

Rating:
Summary: Great, wonderful, amazing, every word of that sort.....
Review: This was the most touching story I have ever read. When Little Rose's friend dies, you want to pray with all of your hart to everyone that knew her. It is a butifull story of hope, love, faith, and friendship. Please, read this book. (It was one of those books that makes you listen about indians in Social Studies Class.)

Rating:
Summary: Great Book!
Review: I loved this book! It was one of the best I ever read. It realy tells about what it was like to be an Indian at that time.There where a fe w sad things that happened but I realy enjoyed it.

Rating:
Summary: An Exelent Book
Review: I thought this book is exelent!In this book you can feel what Nannie is going through. Her sorrows, her happiness,and most of all her life. I cried and felt sad but at the happy parts I felt happy too.

Rating:
Summary: this book misrepresents native cultures & experiences
Review: As a scholar with 15 years experience in the history of Indian education; and as a native person whose family has been profoundly influenced by my father's childhood in an Indian boarding school (Chilocco Indian Agricultural School in Oklahoma), I am deeply disappointed in this publication. It is depressing that this kind of white fantasy can be passed off as "impeccable and sensitive" native history, in a format that most people cannot distinguish as fiction, because it is so carefully packaged as autobiographical "fact." I am not well grounded in Lakota studies, and will leave those portions of the book that claim to represent Lakota life to others. I would like to comment on the Hopi character, Belle Rain Water, who is highly improbable. Belle draws a "scalping party" for an art class assignment (p. 61). No such thing among Hopis, who are rather renowned pacifists. Why in heaven's name would she pick such a topic, and how would she know what it might look like? Although scalp taking was part of some native societies' military actions (even Hopi, in extraordinary and circumscribed situations) the notion of a "scalping party" is part of white America's fantasy about Indians. In a confrontation between Belle and Nannie (p. 88), Belle calls Nannie a witch. Witchcraft is a dangerous reality in Hopi life, and is taken very seriously. No Hopi would discuss it lightly, or accuse someone face-to-face. The girls go swimming and Belle, swimming nude, taunts their modesty (p. 114). Hopi notions of maidenly modesty in the 19th century did not include girls swimming nude; the whole notion of swimming was problematic for girls for philosophical reasons. Consider the practical problems: where would she have learned? Not at Hopi -- no lakes or swimming pools. On p. 144, Belle tries to make peace with Nannie, and says "we must light the Council Fire." "Council fire" is another white stereotype; it has nothing to do with Hopi cultural or political life. As for Belle's gift to Nannie of a prayer feather -- it is possible Belle might have such a thing at school, and would want to give it to a friend -- but, how could Nannie keep it "in her window"? The staff at Carlisle did not allow native religious belief or practice; why would they have overlooked such a thing? Numerous phrasings in this book reinforce white stereotypes about American Indians. The following examples are self-serving assertions that America's conquest of Indians was inevitable, well-intentioned, and the best thing to happen, all things considered: · The white people are very powerful (p. 7) · "the old ways are done" (p. 24) · Nannie's brother "shames" her by doing a Lakota dance (a "war dance," and done nearly nude, more stereotyping) · "it is as the history teacher said . . . the Sioux people have been conquered" (p. 63) · for the first enrollees at Carlisle, "it was their only chance for a future" (177) Carlisle was not their only chance for a future, as all the non-Carlisle students and their lives attest. The book portrays Indians as backward, defeated victims (and pretty much all as "Plains Indians," who hunted buffalo: p. 175). Legally speaking, the statement on p. 12 attributed to Nannie that the whites "give us" the Black Hills in the Treaty of 1868, is incorrect. Treaties were legal instruments conceived by Europeans to transfer title to lands from one nation to another (among other political uses, such as making a peace). The Treaty of 1868 was a legal instrument by which the Lakota transferred title for ceded lands to the U.S., and reserved or kept the Black Hills. The flash point for many native critics is Rinaldi's use of real children's names taken from Carlisle gravestones: ". . . their personalities came through to me with such force and inspiration, I had to use them. I am sure that in whatever Happy Hunting Ground they now reside, they will forgive this artistic license, and even smile upon it" (p. 196). "Happy Hunting Ground" is an anachronistic, patronizing, stereotypical phrase. Second, the assumption that no living native person needed to be consulted is perfectly clear. Rinaldi is guilty of profound arrogance to assume that dead Indian children would approve of her appropriation of their lives. To conclude -- the focus on Lucy being buried alive. As if it wasn't tough enough to be a student, or to survive being a student at that time. This is "impeccable and sensitive" history? More evidence that the people responsible for this book have not a clue nor care that native people, and descendants of Carlisle students, still live, breathe, and feel. What a shame.

Rating:
Summary: I loved this Book All my friends love it.
Review: It's so great all my friends want to read it. Also my sister . I have a direy of my own I write all about this book.

Rating:
Summary: This girl had just come from a tribe what do you expect?
Review: Nannie Little Rose was a girl who was picked to go to the white man's world school.She was a good person and at times I didn't understand her,but otherwise it was a great book.All you people who say this book is a piece of trash,well you all are WRONG, because it was a GREAT BOOK.