Christine Sleeter

The Inheritance Christine Sleeter

If you inherit something, do you also inherit responsibility for its history, even if you have no awareness of that history? After tracing the house she inherited from her grandmother to the selling of land stolen from the Utes, Denise must decide whether to stand up for her family or her convictions. The Inheritance explores how someone who benefitted directly from the removal of an American Indian tribe from their lands comes to understand how that happened and what one can do about it. Denise wrestles with guilt on hearing about the impact of land theft directly from a Ute elder. How much responsibility does she bear for what happened long before she was born? As a fourth-grade teacher charge with teaching state history, how much can she change the prescribed curriculum in order to teach history from Indigenous viewpoints? As she gradually weighs various responses, Denise comes to terms with who she is in relationship to those around her.