Neither Wolf Nor Dog

Nerburn receives a call from a Lakota woman asking him to come visit her grandfather, who read the books that Nerburn edited alongside students on the Red Lake Ojibwe reservation. Nerburn feels anxious that the books angered the caller’s grandfather: although they were celebrated by many indigenous people, others felt that they opened old wounds or misrepresented Ojibwe stories. The caller promises that her grandfather isn’t angry. Remembering how happy he felt while working with indigenous people, Nerburn agrees to visit.

When Nerburn arrives on the reservation, he buys a pack of tobacco to give to Dan (who is not yet named) as a sign of respect. Dan accepts it, then asks Nerburn whether he likes white people. Nerburn admits that he’s often embarrassed by white people, but that he likes them. Dan tells Nerburn that he’s trustworthy because he doesn’t try to be indigenous. He shows Nerburn his writing, and asks him to help transform it into a book. Nerburn dismisses Dan’s concerns about being perceived as an old indigenous man, inadvertently insulting him. Nerburn spends the night revising the pages to be more accessible to white audiences, then returns them to Dan. The men agree to work together.

Nerburn spends months working on the notes and essays Dan sends home with him. He struggles to see the connection between ideas and stories but tries to find a way to make them coherent for white readers as Dan asked. When Nerburn returns to Dan’s house, he reads one of the pieces to Dan and his friends. The essay is formatted like a speech in which Dan calls for a union between indigenous and non-indigenous people based in forgiveness. He points to the Earth as a manifestation of forgiveness, noting that the Earth sends new growth even after humans harm it with mining and deforestation. When Nerburn is finished reading, Dan seems pleased, but his friend Grover walks away without speaking.

Dan and Grover have a discussion in Lakota, which Nerburn does not speak. Dan explains that Grover thinks Nerburn made him sound like a white man’s stereotype of an indigenous person. Grover tells Nerburn to write Dan honestly, rather than picking out only the idealized parts of him. Nerburn leaves, discouraged. The next morning, he returns to find Dan burning all of the writing and documents he has saved. Dan tells Nerburn he will dictate his thoughts to him directly.

The next day, Nerburn and Dan smoke a tobacco pipe together. Dan chastises Nerburn for not admitting that he was unhappy with Grover’s criticism of the project and Dan’s decision to burn his notes. He tells Nerburn that smoking tobacco is a sacred promise, and that Grover was obligated to tell the truth about his feelings.

Nerburn and Dan drive out to a high ridge deep in the reservation. Dan makes a tobacco offering to the four directions, then tells Nerburn how indigenous people lost their lands. He explains that indigenous nations were willing to let people pass through their ancestral lands if the strangers did not harm the land. When the first European settlers (Catholic priests) arrived, they prayed in a way that made indigenous communities trust them. As years passed, the settlers began taking more and more from the land, until eventually they demanded the land itself. This demand confused indigenous people, who viewed the land as a sacred relative rather than a possession to be taken and owned. They could not understand the European view of land as property. Dan claims that this possessive view of the land killed the indigenous spirit and separated them from their sacred places. He warns Nerburn that the Earth will respond.

Nerburn decides that the best way to capture Dan’s words is just to spend time with him and listen. He begins recording their conversations. One afternoon, Dan’s granddaughter Wenonah refers to him as a “wily old Indian” (55). Nerburn asks whether the term “Indian” bothers Dan. Dan replies that some people are bothered by the term because it represents a mistake that white people never bothered to fix. He insists that the real problem is people applying the word “Indian” to mascots that embody dangerous stereotypes of indigenous people. Even worse than the mascots themselves, Dan says, white people insist that indigenous people not be offended by them.

Dan grows increasingly agitated as he talks about treatment of indigenous people. He explains that the term “native American” is as inaccurate as “Indian,” because indigenous nations pre-date the invention of America. He challenges the notion that indigenous communities came to North America via the Bering Strait, insisting that they were placed on the land by the Creator. He argues that debates over naming distract from white America’s efforts to eliminate indigenous people from the land and from history. Sensing her grandfather is overwhelmed, Wenonah signals for Nerburn to leave.