After a long day of harvesting vegetables and mowing lawns on my romantic partner's place on the Lake Traverse Reservation, home of the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate Dakota, I was delighted to read in the Mankato Free Press article MSU's Westerman named Minnesota poet laureate by Tim Krohn:
Gwen Westerman, an English professor at Minnesota State University, is the first Native American to be appointed as Minnesota’s poet laureate.
Gov. Tim Walz and Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan made the announcement Thursday.
“It is an honor to serve as the poet laureate and help elevate poetry across the state,” Westerman said in a statement. “I am excited for the opportunity to share the beauty of poetry and to engage and celebrate the voices of all Minnesotans.”
She is co-author of “Mni Sota Makoce: The Land of the Dakota,” which won two Minnesota Book Awards and an AASLH Leadership in History Award. Her poetry collection “Follow the Blackbirds” is written in English and Dakota, one of her heritage languages.
Her poems and essays can be found in POETRY, Yellow Medicine Review, Water-Stone Review, Natural Bridge and at poetryfoundation.org
Westerman has long been involved in efforts to increase the knowledge about Native Americans, particularly the Dakota. . . .
Westerman told The Free Press in April that most people don’t think about the impact Lincoln had on the people who were not hanged. The rest of the men and their families were expelled from Mankato and sent to a prison in Davenport, Iowa.
“I’m not minimizing the hanging of the 38,” Westerman said. “But we also need to take into consideration the descendants of the men who were spared and how that impacted generations of people.”
She's right. While I learned about the 1862 War and the hangings in high school, I knew little about what happened to the people who were forced out of Minnesota after the war.
Our partner's great-grandfather, Charles Crawford, is one of the men who was tried but acquitted in the military courts after the war; he was almost shot in the forced march from Mankato to Fort Snelling. There's more about his "epic life" in this historian's consideration of the Supreme Court case, United States v. Rickert.
We met Westerman several years ago at a book signing for "Mni Sota Makoce: The Land of the Dakota," at a book store in Granite Falls that was sponsored by CURE, the rural environmental and clean energy organization based in Montevideo.
Westerman is an enrolled member of the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate and the Cherokee Nation.
At the Star Tribune, Richard Chin reports in Mankato English professor named Minnesota's first Native poet laureate:
. . . She has written about Dakota history and language and has won two Minnesota Book Awards for her work about Dakota people, "Mni Sota Makoce: The Land of the Dakota." Her poetry collection, "Follow the Blackbirds," was written in English and Dakota.
Also a fiber artist, Westerman with works in the permanent collections of the Minnesota Historical Society, the Great Plains Art Museum, the University Art Galleries at the University of South Dakota and the Children's Museum of Southern Minnesota.
Her website also says she's worked as a proofreader, a waitress, an editor, a sandwich delivery driver, a technical writer and a teacher.
Westerman will be the state's third poet laureate since the post was officially created in 2007. The previous poet laureates were Robert Bly and Joyce Sutphen.
The poet laureate is expected to promote and encourage appreciation and engagement with poetry and elevate the state's poets and authors. The post comes with a $3,500 annual stipend.
That's some fine company. It's also good to see the Star Tribune mention the book and it's author together in its copy. In June, the oped section published Center of the American Experiment ideologue Katherine Kersten's commentary, Counterpoint: Small group of activists commandeers Minnesota Historical Society.
Nice to see Westerman's name restored. Our partner's family stories about the war and the aftermath parallel those in Westerman's book.
Related posts:
- Welcome to Historic Fort Snelling at Bdote, or maybe not under Christian right's Project Blitz
- Under the surface: pagan's HRO, MNSenate historical site pilfering, EPA chlorpyrifos action
Photo: Gwen Westerman. State of Minnesota.
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