Mission Statement

I will tell you something about stories,
[he said]
They aren’t just entertainment.
Don’t be fooled.
They are all we have, you see,
all we have to fight off
illness and death

You don’t have anything
if you don’t have stories.

Their evil is mighty
but it can’t stand up to our stories
so they try to destroy the stories
let the stories be confused or forgotten.
They would like that
They would be happy
Because we would be defenseless then.

He rubbed his belly.
I keep them here
[he said]
Here, put your hand on it
See, it is moving.
There is life here
for the people.

And in the belly of this story
the rituals and the ceremony
are still growing.

- From Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko



"As with any generation
the oral tradition depends upon each person
listening and remembering a portion
and it is together--
all of us remembering what we have heard together--
that creates the whole story
the long story of the people."
--Leslie Marmon Silko




Ts'its'tsi'nako, Thought-Woman,
is sitting in her room
and whatever she thinks about
appears.
She thought of her sisters,
Nau'ts'ityi and I'tcts'ity'i,
and together they created the Universe
this world
and the four worlds below.
Thought-Woman, the spider,
named things and
as she named them
they appeared.
She is sitting in her room
thinking of a story now
I'm telling you the story
she is thinking.

--From Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko