2022
Trickster Academy, University of Arizona Press (2022)
Trickster Academy is a collection of poems that explore being Native in Academia—from land acknowledgement statements, to mascots, to the histories of using Native American remains in anthropology. Jenny L. Davis’ collection brings humor and uncomfortable realities together in order to challenge the academy and discuss the experience of being Indigenous in university classrooms and campuses. Organized around the premise of the Trickster Academy— a university space run by, and meant for training, Tricksters— this collection moves between the personal dynamics of a Two-Spirit/queer Indigenous woman in spaces where there are few, if any, others and a Trickster’s critique of those same spaces.
Trickster Academy is playful at times, yet more complicated and salient issues are at the heart of these poems. Davis’ Trickster Academy deeply challenges the institutions that still hold Indigenous remains in their archives and storage rooms, and the insincerities of the academy when it comes to acknowledging Indigenous peoples. The realities that the poems in Trickster Academy address are not only relevant to people in academic positions. From leaving home, to being the only Indian in the room, to having to deal with the constant pressures to being a ‘real Indian’, these poems illuminate the shared experiences of Indians across many regions, and all of us who live amongst Tricksters.
Recent Publications
Fiction:
“the seed runner”. Transmotion. Dec. 30, 2018
Comics/Hybrid work:
“Ootfalama (to go and return)”. Anomaly. Issue 30. 2020
Poetry:
Print Journals & Anthologies:
North Dakota Quarterly. 86: 3/4. 2019
–“Saint Pocahontas”
– “Trickster Story”
–“Lullaby for Bones“
Yellow Medicine Review. Spring 2019
-“Chickasaw word for trickster”
-“Abookoshi’ Hapi Oshi (Little Salt Creek)”
Our Poetica. Cathexis Press. June 2019
-“This Poem”
Raven Chronicles Journal: HOME, Vol. 24. 2017
-“Ceremony of Rending”
Resist Much/Obey Little: Inaugural Poems to the Resistance. Dispatches Editions. 2017
-“Over a Barrel”
-“Apocalypse Journals”
-“Indigenous Kinship Systems”
As/US. Volume 6. Spring 2016
-“Before We Were Ashes.”
-“Academic Side Show Woman.”
-“The (American) Indian (Studies) Removal Act of 2014.”
-“Real Indian ABC’s.”
Online Journals:
“Anadromous,” Humana Obsura. April. 2022
“Honor Song for Tulsa,” West Trestle Review. November. 2021
“Life and Limb” West Trestle Review. Sept. 2020
“Teachings of Moss” Poem of the Day. San Francisco Public Library. Jan. 28, 2020
“#21CENTURYINDIANPROBLEMS” Anomaly. Issue 29. 2019
“Just what kind of Trickster are you?” Anomaly. Issue 29. 2019
“Silent Prayer of and Indian Anthropologist before heading to work” Anomaly. Issue 29. 2019
“How Turtle got her shell” River, Blood, and Corn. April 9, 2019
“A Seat at the Trickster’s Table” Santa Ana River Review, Feb. 3, 2019
“Gifts between Ghosts” Anomaly. Issue 25, 2017
“Bone Songs” Anomaly. Issue 25, 2017
“Indigenous Kinship Systems” Broadsided, #NoDAPL Responses: Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) Action at Standing Rock, 2016-2017, edited by Tiffany Midge. February 10, 2017.
“Submergence.” Rabbit and Rose. Issue 10. 2016
“Ofi’ Tohbi’ Ihina’.” River, Blood, and Corn, Aug. 2016,
-Republished in The 90%: Stories of Diaspora from Indian Country, Sept. 2016
“The Girl Who Loves Turtles.” River, Blood, and Corn, Aug. 2016
“Let Us Rest.” River, Blood, and Corn, Aug. 2016
“Ofi’ Tohbi’.” Rabbit and Rose. Issue 09. Spring 2016.
Work in Curated Exhibits
2021 “Our Stories Were Not Lost,” Series of 4. Digital. Honoring Indigenous Womxn: Bridging
Our Communities Exhibit. Curated by Acacia Patterson. Washington State University. Pullman, WA.
2020 “Birth of Deer Woman” Digital. Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women & Girls Exhibit, Curated by William Johnson. Ziibiwing Center of Anishinabe Culture and Lifeways, Mount Pleasant, MI.
2017 “Indigenous kinship systems” (About that) Water is Life. Curated by Heid E. Erdrich. Minnesota Center for Book Arts. Minneapolis, MN. June 9, 2017 – August 13.
2017 “Akankabi’ v. Sinti’ losa (Hawk v. black snake)”, 30”x 24” Digital. Standing Rock Solid Exhibit, Curated by William Johnson. Ziibiwing Center of Anishinabe Culture and Lifeways, Mount Pleasant, MI. April 22-Sept. 30. Ayer Collection, Newberry Library, Chicago, IL (Ayer broadside E99.D1 D34 2016)
Jenny L. Davis 