Esther Belin

Esther G. Belin
Born	(1968-07-02) July 2, 1968 Gallup, New Mexico
Occupation	Artist, writer, poet, writing instructor, and addiction counselor
Education	Antioch University, the Institute of American Indian Arts, and the University of California, Berkeley
Literary movement	Works based upon Navajo philosophy
Notable works	From the Belly of My Beauty, "Of Cartography: Poems (Sun Tracks)"
Notable awards	American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation (2000)
Website
www.estherbelin.com

Esther Belin (born July 2, 1968) is a Diné multimedia artist, writer, poet, writing instructor, and addiction counselor. The Before Columbus Foundation chose From the Belly of My Beauty for the American Book Award after the book was published in 1999. She was one of the editors of The Diné Reader: An Anthology of Navajo Literature that was published in 2021. It is on the Lists of Best Books, 2010-2023 by the American Indians in Children's Literature (AICL).

Early life and education

Belin, born in Gallup, New Mexico on July 2, 1968, was raised in Los Angeles by her Navajo parents, Susan and Eddie Belin. She is a member of the matrilineal Zia clan of the Diné, through her maternal grandmother Pearl Toledo, and is related to the Bittersweet clan.

Her mother and father were part of the Federal Indian relocation program of the 1950s and 1960s, which relocated them to Riverside, California to the Sherman Indian High School.

She is a graduate of the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico, as well as the University of California, Berkeley. She finished a Master of Fine Arts program. While at the University of California, Berkeley, Belin worked with the Native American Studies department to create three videos, The Princess, shown at the L.A. Film Festival, Beyond the Squaw, and Surviving in This Place Called the United States".

Career

Belin is the author of a collection of poetry, From the Belly of My Beauty, published in 1999 by the University of Arizona Press. The book won the American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation in 2000. It is about what it is like to grow up in the white world of Southern California as an Indian whose parents were relocated to Navajo Nation, a Navajo reservation. She calls herself a "U.R.I." or Urban-Raised Indian.

Of Cartography, published in 2017, is a collection of poems that is organized using the Diné culture's Four Sacred Directions: East, South, West, and North. She says that her poems are like road maps, where identity is shaped by the landscape. "Road narratives are typical of Navajo people. We travel so much, especially for work or school. You gain an appreciation for your culture and the land and the landscape as you're driving and telling stories. Natural markers are universal to people; it's connection with a place." She writes online poems like, "X+X+X+X-X-X-X." According to a review from Library Journal, "Belin provides graphic descriptions of the 'wounds' one endures remaining true to a 'native lifestyle.'" Writing poetry helps her feel less marginalized.

In 2017, she was working on a biography through poem of Jim Thorpe, a member of the Sac and Fox Nation who won an Olympic gold medal. Sherman Alexie considers Belin to be one of his favorite Native writers. She was an editor of The Diné Reader: An Anthology of Navajo Literature that was published in 2021. It is on the Lists of Best Books, 2010-2023 by the American Indians in Children's Literature (AICL).

Belin taught writing at the high school level and at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado by 2012. By 2017, Belin worked as an intake and addiction counselor at the Peaceful Spirit Treatment Center, an addiction center, on the Southern Ute Indian Reservation and near the Ute Mountain Ute, Navajo, and Jicarilla Apache reservations of the Four Corners region.

As a multi-media artist, she has created Bound Sky, Pretty Tough, and Standing on the Outside, Sitting on the Outside installations. She has had a booth at the Santa Fe Indian Market.

Activist

Belin is an activist seeking to tell the real story of the effect of European colonization of the United States, starting in 1492 with Christopher Columbus's exploitation of Indigenous people of the Caribbean. Ironically, Columbus Day is a holiday meant to celebrate the man. She supports the "Real History of the Americas" day to celebrate Native American's culture and traditions and tell the story of colonization of the Americas from the Native people's experiences and perspectives. Without the tools to heal from the pain of exploitation and genocide, many Native Americans are left traumatized. Articulating the pain is important to healing the trauma. She said in a 2012 Democracy Now! broadcast at Fort Lewis College, "[I]t's super important for us to start that healing process and then, as well, to talk about it and to guide other people around their own trauma, which it is an historical trauma. It's legitimate, and it is as valid as the pain where some people have no idea where it came from. And that discovery is—you know, to give articulation to that is so powerful, it’s so emotional." In an interview with Belin, Jeff Berglund writes, "For Belin, writing is activism, activism is writing."

Personal life

Belin met fellow student Dan Edd, a sculptor and a painter, at the Institute of American Indian Arts. They were married and had — four daughters Sierra, Ruthie, Chamisa, and Santana — born between 1995 and 2003. All artists, they have participated in the Santa Fe Indian Market since they were children. They continued as filmmakers, photographers, and artists. Based upon her spirit of activism, she has raised her daughters to be protestors. She states, "People... don't want to be responsible for dropping the cultural ball of preservation. Somewhere we were tricked into believing that we are no longer in a state of emergency."

After Belin graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, she lived in Torreon near the Navajo Nation in New Mexico for more than 20 years. In the same state, she then lived in Santa Fe and Farmington. They lived after that in Durango, Colorado.

Works

Films

While at the University of California, Berkeley, Belin made:

• The Princess, shown at the L.A. Film Festival
• Beyond the Squaw
• Surviving in This Place Called the United States

Poetry

Esther Belin's books

• From the Belly of My Beauty. Sun traks, v. 38. University of Arizona Press. 1999. ISBN 978-0-8165-1954-5., including "Bringing Hannah Home", "Blues-ing on the Brown Vibe", and "Night Travel"
• Of Cartography: Poems. University of Arizona Press. 2017. ISBN 978-0-8165-3602-3.

Within other books

• Allen, Paula Gunn, ed. (1996). Song of the Turtle: American Indian Literature 1974-1994. One World/Ballantine. ISBN 978-0-345-37525-4.
• Erdrich, Heid E.; Tohe, Laura, eds. (2002). Sister nations : Native American women writers on community. Minnesota Historical Society Press. ISBN 0-87351-428-9.
• Goeman, Mishuana (2013). "(Re)routing Native Mobility, Uprooting Settler Spaces in the Poetry of Esther Belin". Mark My Words: Native Women Mapping Our Nations. University of Minnesota Press. ISBN 978-0-8166-7791-7.
• Leong, Russell; University of California, Los Angeles Asian American Studies Center; Southern California Asian American Studies Central. Visual Communications (1991). Moving the image : independent Asian Pacific American media arts. Los Angeles: UCLA Asian American Studies Center and Visual Communications, Southern California Asian American Studies Central. pp. 245–247. ISBN 978-0-934052-13-9.
• Ortiz Simon J., ed. (1997). Speaking for the Generations: Native Writers on Writing. University of Arizona Press. ISBN 978-0-8165-1850-0.
• Walters, Anna Lee, ed. (1993). Neon Pow-Wow: New Native American Voices of the Southwest. Northland Publishing. ISBN 978-0-87358-562-0.

Editor

• The Diné Reader: An Anthology of Navajo Literature. University of Arizona Press. 2021. ISBN 978-0-8165-4099-0., with other editors

See also

• List of writers from peoples indigenous to the Americas

Further reading

• A Study Guide for Esther Belin's "Night Travel". Farmington Hills, Michigan: Gale, Cengage Learning. ISBN 978-1-5358-4526-7.

External links

• Official website
• Poetry Foundation - Esther Belin