Ambiguity and Identity

Like many other contemporary Native American stories, "Yellow Woman" is concerned with liminality, which is a state of being between two worlds or two states of existance. In the Native American world view, "nature" includes the spirits as well as the animals and people who inhabit the land, and the land itself. The unnamed narrator of "Yellow Woman" finds herself between two worlds— that of her everyday life and that of the mythic history of her people. It is also significant that from the bluff in front of Silva's house in the foothills, he can point out both Texan and Mexican lands to the narrator, underscoring that the story itself takes place in a borderland region.

That Silko never names the narrator of "Yellow Woman" adds to the story's ambiguity. The narrator and her companion potentially occupy several realms of reality at once. On one...