Paula Gunn Allen papers

Paula Gunn Allen (1939-2008) was a Native American author, literary critic, activist, and scholar known for her contributions to American Indian studies and the nascent field of Indigenous feminism. She was also a founding leader in the contemporary women’s spirituality movement.

Allen was born on October 24, 1939 and grew up in a village on the Cubero land grant in New Mexico. Of mixed Laguna, Sioux, Scottish, and Lebanese-American descent, Allen identified most closely with the Laguna, among whom she spent her childhood and upbringing.

Allen received her BA in English in 1966 and her MFA in creative writing in 1968, both from the University of Oregon. She earned her PhD in American studies in 1976 from the University of New Mexico. She was a professor of Native American and ethnic studies at the University of California, Berkeley and was later a professor of English, creative writing, and American Indian studies at the University of California, Los Angeles before she retired in 1999.

Allen’s work was widely recognized and was the recipient of many literary honors, including postdoctoral fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Ford Foundation-National Research Council, the Hubbell Medal for Lifetime Achievement in American Literary Studies from the Modern Language Association, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers’ Circle of the Americas, the Susan Koppelman Award from the Popular and American Culture Associations, the Native American Prize for Literature, and a Lannan Foundation Fellowship.

Paula Gunn Allen died at her home in Ft. Bragg, California, on May 29, 2008.