Reviews

When Did Indians Become Straight?: Kinship, the History of Sexuality, and Native Sovereignty by Mark Rifkin

trinityturnsthepage's review against another edition

read my excerpt for class

marthabreads's review against another edition

informative slow-paced

4.0

minosh's review

4.0

I FINALLY finished this book. Totally did not understand all of it (I'm going to be rereading the intro many times yet) but the overal arguments (about the dual use of Native kinship by early white writers, about the bribe of straightness, etc) seem solid to me. Still trying to figure out the overall argument re: kinship though.

aimiller's review

3.0

[really more like 3.5 stars] A very thoughtful and thorough book, though I think Rifkin gets caught up sometimes in the complexity of his own thoughts (especially given the amount he uses "said another way" as a construction--enough that I took note of it!) Some really interesting and useful pieces in here, especially surrounding the bribe of straightness, but I don't know that I would use it in a classroom per se, just because I think there are other things going on. Might use the introduction in excerpt though, since it has some really interesting things to say about sovereignty! But definitely worth your time to read though.