De-Blading the Knife - (Objects Talk Back) by Cristina Rivera Garza (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Rooted in Mexican and indigenous practices, De-blading theKnife is Pulitzer Prize winner Cristina Rivera Garza's profound meditation on the erasure of violence against women. Inspired by a walrus-ivory Story Knife from the Arctic region, De-blading theKnife creates a multi-faceted narration that asks: what is remembered? How? For whom? The ephemeral strokes of a Story Knife were traditionally drawn by young Yupik girls into soil or snow to repeat old tales that would then fade away. Mexican writer Cristina Rivera Garza connects this empowering ancient Indigenous practice to the "violentometro," a contemporary tool designed in Mexico to measure instances of intimate partner violence. The story of violence against women constantly disappears even as it is continuously told and re-told, but perhaps a Story Knife may play a role in reversing such erasure.

About the Author

Cristina Rivera Garza was born in Matamoros, Mexico. She is a writer, translator, and critic. Her recent publications include Liliana's Invincible Summer, which won the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for Memoir; Grieving: Dispatches from a Wounded Country, which was shortlisted for the 2021 NBCC Awards in criticism; and The Taiga Syndrome, which won the 2018 Shirley Jackson Award. She is the Hugh Rot and Lillie Cranz Cullen Distinguished Chair and founder of the PhD Program in Creative Writing in Spanish at the University of Houston, Department of Hispanic Studies. Priya Basil is a writer and curator for the project Objects Talk Back. Her published work includes novels, nonfiction, essays, plays, and short stories. She is co-founder and board member of WIR MACHEN DAS, an NGO that works with refugees and migrants for a more inclusive society. She is also on the advisory board of the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights.