JOSEPHINE LITTLETREE IBD

Sinopse

We sing songs about birds. áThey canâÇÖt understand them. áThereâÇÖs a song about us we canâÇÖt understand. áSome of us hear it. áTo each itâÇÖs a different song and a different singer. áI hear a bird that canâÇÖt sing. áI hear the raven.áJosephine Littletree, a mixed-race aboriginal, grows up in British Columbia in the 1930s. áAt a residential school priests and nuns try to "kill the Indian" in her. áShe escapes and lives for years in her peopleâÇÖs hunting grounds but when she leaves faces prejudice again from white society. áHer early relationships fall victim to it. áSometimes itâÇÖs a wild ride through a world of bootlegging, battering, prostitutes, bank robbery and the paranormal. áOvercoming her addiction to alcohol, she takes her grandmotherâÇÖs advice and gathers together the myths of her people in a book and becomes a storyteller. áDuring World War II she meets a white man who falls in love with her. áShe lives with him in his shack on the waterfront. áThey are both outsiders, but with a difference that dooms their relationship. áReturning to her reserve to take care of her sick grandmother, she contracts tuberculosis and retuses to see him any more. áHis letters go unanswered. áIn a sanatorium she meets with prejudice for the last time. áIn a final gesture of defiance and accetptance she goes back to her reserve. áShe writes about her life with acid humour, bitterness and regret. áWhen the love between and man and a woman isnâÇÖt equal, thereâÇÖs a reason. áThe man she rejects has chosen to be an outsider. áShe was born one.