Language, Memory, and Resistance: Examining Indigenous Cultural Heritage and Sovereignty through the Theory of Linguistic Ideology in Cherie Dimaline's Novel 'The Marrow Thieves' Journal Article

Original Title: زبان،حافظه و مقاومت: بررسی میراث فرهنگی بومی و حاکمیت از طریق نظریه ایدئولوژی زبان در رمان «سارقان مغز استخوان» اثر چری دیمالین

تحلیل گفتمان ادبی تابستان 1404، دوره سوم - شماره 2 (‎21 page(s) - From 96 to 116 )

Keywords: Identity culture Indigenous peoples linguistic ideologies The Marrow Thieves Cherie Dimaline Paul V Kroskrity Indigenous

Abstract:

This study examines how Cherie Dimaline’s The Marrow Thieves (2017) portrays Indigenous languages as cultural heritage, embodied inheritance, and tools of resistance through Paul V. Kroskrity’s concept of language ideologies. The novel depicts a future where North America’s Indigenous peoples are hunted for their ability to dream; a phenomenon closely linked to cultural memory and ancestral languages. Thus, the main argument focuses on how the novel presents Indigenous languages as both vital repositories of cultural memory and sovereign, embodied practices that oppose assimilation. Using Kroskrity’s framework, complemented by insights from Leanne Hinton, Teresa McCarty, and Indigenous literary theory, this paper conducts close textual analysis of the novel’s portrayals of language in dreams, stories, and everyday survival. The approach combines literary interpretation with linguistic anthropology, demonstrating how language functions not only as a means of communication but also as an ontological force connected to land, lineage, and collective future. The findings suggest that Dimaline views language as non-extractable and regenerative, challenging both historical policies of assimilation and potential biotechnological exploitation. Furthermore, this analysis advances scholarship on Indigenous language revitalization by emphasizing the embodied and ecological aspects of linguistic sovereignty in post-apocalyptic fiction.

Machine summary:

Language of Memory and Resistance: Examining Indigenous Cultural Heritage and Sovereignty through the Theory of Language Ideology in Cherie Dimaline's The Marrow Thieves Shahre Shokri MA in English Language and Literature and Linguistics, Faculty of Language and Literature, University of Kurdistan (sahere. 23 Abstract The present research examines how Cherie Dimaline's The Marrow Thieves (2017) portrays Indigenous languages as embodied cultural heritage and tools of resistance through Paul Valery Kroskrity's concept of language ideologies. Keywords The Marrow Thieves, Cherie Dimaline, Indigenous, Paul Valery Kroskrity, Language Ideologies, Identity, Culture Citation: Shokri, Shahre and Bezdodeh, Zakia (2025). Language of Memory and Resistance: Examining Indigenous Cultural Heritage and Sovereignty through the Theory of Language Ideology in Cherie Dimaline's The Marrow Thieves. Dimaline's novel makes these ideologies tangible: words emerge in marrow, dreams manifest in ancestral tongues, and storytelling circles become spaces where identity is repaired after centuries of assimilative violence. Consequently, this paper demonstrates that language in The Marrow Thieves operates on three intertwined registers: (1) cultural inheritance that safeguards ancestral wisdom, (2) embodied memory that endures in subconscious dreaming, and (3) tactical resistance against state structures that seek to commodify Indigenous bodies while silencing their voices. Within this framework, The Marrow Thieves presents language as a living archive of tradition, ecological knowledge, and communal identity, resources that losing them destabilizes the cultural foundations of Indigenous life. The state's harvesting of Indigenous bone marrow, framed as a solution to widespread dream loss among settlers, mirrors the extractive logics of historical residential schools, where bodies became sites of linguistic and cultural erasure.

Download citation file :
(پژوهیار, , , )

Shortlink: