Crossing the (Indian) Color Line: A Family History

In June 1931, Deloria’s grandmother—white, patrician, and pious, with a good job in New York City—agreed to marry his grandfather, an American Indian athlete-turned-minister whom she had met only a few days earlier. Their surprising union brought together two grand histories of colonial encounter. Deloria will write their history and also inquire into the consequences of their marriage, which unleashed devastating tensions surrounding racial crossing, the authority of men and women, the preservation and recording of Native cultures, and the possibilities for reconciliation among histories and memories defined by the dispossession of Native North America.