A Gathering Of Spirit by Beth Brant (All Editions)

A Gathering of Spirit: A Collection of Writing and Art by North American Indian Women was the first published collection of Indigenous women’s writing in North America, as well as the first anthology edited by an aboriginal woman.

The book was edited by Mohawk author and anthologist Beth Brant. It was first published in 1983 as a special issue of the lesbian literary magazine Sinister Wisdom. The collection was subsequently published in 1988 by New York’s Firebrand Books, and republished in 1989 by Women’s Press in Toronto, Ontario. The anthology featured literary contributions from women aged 21–65, both lesbian and heterosexual, and representing 40 native nations.

Contributing authors included

Paula Gunn Allen (Laguna Pueblo descendant)

Barbara May Cameron (Hunkpapa)

Chrystos (self-identified Menominee ancestry)

Janice Gould (Koyangk’auwi Maidu)

Joy Harjo (Muscogee)

Bea Medicine (Sihasapa and Minneconjou)

Terri Meyette (Yaqui)

Midnight Sun (Anishnawbe)

Mary Moran (Métis)

Kateri Sardella (Micmac)

Vickie Sears (Cherokee)

Anita Valerio (Blood/Chicana)

Subjects: American literature, American Literature – Indian Authors, American literature – Women authors, Canadian Literature, Canadian Literature – Indian Authors, Canadian Literature – Women Authors, Indian Women – Literary Collections, Indians Of North America – Literary Collections, Women – Literary Collections

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A Gathering of Spirit (1984), edited by Mohawk author Beth Brant (Degonwadonti), is a landmark anthology that redefined the landscape of North American literature. Originally published as a special issue of the lesbian journal Sinister Wisdom, it was the first collection of Indigenous women’s writing and art to be edited exclusively by an Indigenous woman.

The collection is a defiant act of “writing as witness,” featuring 61 contributors from 40 different Native nations. Brant intentionally sought out voices traditionally silenced by both colonial society and their own communities, including lesbian/Two-Spirit women and women in prison. The result is a vibrant tapestry of poetry, letters, and art that explores themes of survival, recovery from colonialism, and the reclaiming of sacred queer identities.

More than just a book, A Gathering of Spirit served as a foundational text for Indigenous feminism and Queer Indigenous Theory. It remains a powerful testament to the endurance of Native women and their refusal to be “stoic” or “vanishing.”

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