American Indians Go Graphic

The use of sequential art in retelling and reshaping historical narratives is a time-tested practice. From genre-defining classics like Maus and Persepolis to Pride of Baghdad and Ghost River, writers and illustrators have expanded the boundaries of the comic book format to provide insight and accessibility to historical events as well as reshaping the visual narrative by providing situated contexts. Although American Indian identity is often historicized, the use of comic books and graphic novels to reframe colonial narratives from American Indian perspectives has been instrumental in demonstrating American Indian agency and self-determination, while simultaneously reestablishing contextual visual representations. Additionally, the importance of understanding community protocols and weaving community voices within the narratives indigenizes not only the product but the process as well.  

Francis, Lee IV (Pueblo of Laguna first descendant). “Code: Love.” In The Tales of the Mighty Code Talkers V.1. Illus. by Arigon Starr (Kickapoo Tribe of Oklahoma citizen). Edited by Arigon Starr. Native Realities LLC, 2016. Lilly Library, Duke University. Label written by Iyesha Belgrave. 

The red words are translated from Kiowa, which Thomas utilizes as a code talker on the World War II battlefront. The panel portrays Sheila and her lover, Thomas, as he informs her he will be going to war. They are reunited at a field hospital, where she serves as a nurse and is the only one able to understand him. The comic highlights the crucial role that code talkers play from an American Indian perspective.  

Francis, Lee IV (Pueblo of Laguna first descendant). Ghost River. Illus. by Weshoyot Alvitre (Tongva descendant). The Library Company, 2019. Lilly Library, Duke University. 

Ghost River is a graphic novel that retells the 1763 massacre of the Conestoga people by the Paxton Boys in colonial Pennsylvania. Told through American Indian-centered voices and haunting artwork, it challenges dominant settler narratives, exposes the brutality of colonial violence, and honors the lives and memories of those erased from mainstream history. Blending vivid storytelling, historic accuracy, and unique art, it offers a powerful act of remembrance, resistance, and cultural resurgence.  

Roberts, Alaina E. (Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma citizen). Chilocco: A Comic Book History. Illus. by Johnnie Diacon (Mvskoke Creek Nation citizen). University of Pennsylvania Press, 2023. Lilly Library, Duke University. 

Chilocco tells the story of the Chilocco Indian Agricultural School in Oklahoma, a federal boarding school that operated from 1884 to 1980. Through American Indian-centered narrative and art, this comic explores how American Indian students from various Native Nations navigated forced assimilation while forging their own community and, later, organizing for land rights. It reclaims a complex history of survival, resistance, and memory, challenging official accounts through visual storytelling rooted in lived experience.  

Atalay, Sonia (non-Native) and Jen Shannon (non-Native). Journeys To Complete The Work. No. 1. Illus. by John Swogger (non-Native). NAGPRA Comics, 2020. Courtesy of Lee Francis IV, Ph.D.  

In collaboration with the Ziibiwing Center of Anishinabe Culture and Lifeways, Journeys to Complete the Work weaves a nonfiction narrative regarding the complex, complicated, and highly contested return of “culturally unidentifiable” individuals under NAGPRA (the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act). The story originated from NAGPRA meeting observations and transcripts and was developed through a relational process with members and stakeholders of the Saginaw Chippawa Tribe of Michigan community. 

DigiTreaties Trading Cards. Museum of Indian Arts and Culture, 2024. Courtesy of Lee Francis IV, Ph.D. 

These cards were an educational outcome of the Indigenous Digital Archive’s Treaties Explorer, DigiTreaties.org, which was created by the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture, Santa Fe, New Mexico, in partnership with the US National Archives Office of Innovation and National Archives Foundation.  

For more information check out the digitreaties website: https://digitreaties.org/treaties/about/