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There There

Tommy Orange

Start date: October 1, 2019

Finish date: October 30, 2019

Discussion: Monthly Bonus Reads

Why we're reading this: October Bonus Read- Indigenous Resistance´s Day.

There There by Tommy Orange
[close] October Bonus Read- Indigenous Resistance´s Day.

There There by Tommy Orange

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What Members Thought

Apr 26, 2021 Jeanne rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: read-2024, read-2021, first-nation

There are many books on Native Americans living on reservations, but 78% of Native peoples live off-reservation, 72% in urban and suburban areas. When we focus on one group, we tend to stereotype and miss the broader experience.

Tommy Orange offers a bigger picture by locating his novel There There in Oakland, California, which has about 18,500 Native people.

But what we are is what our ancestors did. How they survived. We are the memories we don’t remember, which live in us, which we feel, whic There are many books on Native Americans living on reservations, but 78% of Native peoples live off-reservation, 72% in urban and suburban areas. When we focus on one group, we tend to stereotype and miss the broader experience.

Tommy Orange offers a bigger picture by locating his novel There There in Oakland, California, which has about 18,500 Native people.

But what we are is what our ancestors did. How they survived. We are the memories we don’t remember, which live in us, which we feel, which make us sing and dance and pray the way we do, feelings from memories that flare and bloom unexpectedly in our lives like blood through a blanket from a wound made by a bullet fired by a man shooting us in the back for our hair, for our heads, for a bounty, or just to get rid of us. (p. 9)

Orange populated There Therewith 12 narrators of varying ages (teens through 60s), genders, and backgrounds (artists, menial laborers, substance abuse counselors and activists). Most were Native, although some may have been Latinx. His characters were often interconnected, although this was unclear to me when first "meeting" them. I appreciated the Cast of Characters, which oriented me as we shifted from one character to another.

Alcatraz is in San Francisco Bay near Oakland and, although only mentioned by one character, is a good metaphor for the Native characters in There There. In 1969, activists protested the US government’s treatment of Native people and attempted to reclaim their rights to land in the Bay Area. Their occupation lasted for 19 months – until the Nixon administration cut off power to the island.

Orange connected Gertrude Stein's (1937) classic observation about Oakland – "There is no there there" – with the Native experience: their land has been built over, stolen, and unrecoverable. There is no there there.

The wound that was made when white people came and took all that they took has never healed. An unattended wound gets infected. Becomes a new kind of wound like the history of what actually happened became a new kind history. All these stories that we haven’t been telling all this time, that we haven’t been listening to, are just part of what we need to heal. Not that we’re broken. And don’t make the mistake of calling us resilient. To not have been destroyed, to not have given up, to have survived, is no badge of honor. Would you call an attempted murder victim resilient? (p. 137)

There There is about this wound and how it festers. Nonetheless, in a strange way, There There is also about healing: "We all fuck up. It’s how we come back from it that matters.” (p. 186) ...more

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Dec 31, 2019 Suzy rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: listened-to, audio-faves, native-american, back-and-forth-in-time, found-community, found-family

I listened to and finished this quite a while ago, but have balked at reviewing it because I think audio is not the best format for experiencing There, There. I really liked the narration and production, but this book follows twelve Native Americans who live in Oakland, California and that was just too many people to keep track of in audio. What I liked about it was the rhythm of the writing and narration. We learn the backstories of these twelve people who were all preparing for a big pow-wow t ...more

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Dec 21, 2020 Joanne rated it it was amazing

This one reminded me of something else I’ve read-or probably watched in a theater. I was reminded of a tension experienced and building , just waiting, waiting, watching for all the players and components to make their way to some sort of explosive climax. I cannot remember what it is I’m trying to think of, but it’s just that delicious experience that you read books or watch movies for. Now that it’s the second to last week in December, I can safely say that There, There is my favorite book of ...more

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