Polingaysi Qöyawayma

Polingaysi Qöyawayma ( ; 1892 – December 6, 1990), also known as Elizabeth Q. White, was a Hopi educator, writer, and potter.

Biography Born to parents Fred (of the Kachina Clan) and Sevenka (of the Coyote Clan), Polingaysi Qöyawayma grew up in Oraibi, a village on Arizona's Hopi Reservation. Her given name means "butterfly sitting among the flowers in the breeze".

Qöyawayma's father worked for Mennonite missionary Henry Voth, who built a school in Oraibi and attempted to win converts to Christianity. Many in the village saw Voth's efforts to enforce attendance as heavy-handed, and this caused a rift between Hopis who opposed and supported the school.

She left to live with a Mennonite family in Newton, Kansas, and to receive missionary training at Bethel College. In 1919 she worked as a substitute teacher in Tuba City and attended the Los Angeles Bible Institute. She later articulated her teaching philosophy:

Her methods eventually met with acceptance and acclaim. In 1941, the Bureau of Indian Affairs chose Qöyawayma to demonstrate bilingual teaching to school officials across the country. This was later renamed the Elizabeth White Hopi Scholarship in her honor.

Writing In 1941, Polingaysi Qöyawayma wrote the novel The Sun Girl: A True Story about Dawamana, about difficult decisions faced by a young Hopi girl. Literary critic Robert Kirsch praised it as "one of the rare and important documents of the Indian experience. It belongs alongside Theodora Kroeber's Ishi as an account of the collision of two cultures."

She also co-wrote Broken Pattern: Sunlight & Shadows of Hopi History with Carlson in 1985.

Pottery After her retirement from teaching, Qöyawayma dedicated herself to music and art, particularly pottery. She created a unique style, using pink clay with raised symbols such as corn and Kokopelli figures. The Heard Museum in Phoenix held an exhibition of her work in the late 1970s, and some of her pots are included in its permanent collection.

Personal life Qöyawayma married Lloyd White, a part-Cherokee man, in 1931. They divorced one or two years later.

Awards and recognition Department of the Interior Distinguished Service Award (1954) Una Hanbury bronze sculpture commissioned by Museum of Northern Arizona (1976) Arizona Indian Living Treasure Award (1978) Heard Museum Gold Medal (1978) Bethel College Outstanding Alumna (1979) Bullock's "Be Beautiful" Award (1984) Arizona Author Award for The Sun Girl (1989) Inducted into the Arizona Women's Hall of Fame (1991)