Paula Gunn Allen, Ph.D., is an American of Laguna Pueblo/Metis descent and Professor Emerita of English and American Indian Studies at UCLA. The author of many books, including the landmark title, The Sacred Hoop, she is credited as the founder of the field of Native American literary studies. She received a fellowship from the Ford Foundation-National Research Council to study the oral tradition in Native American literature, a writing fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, and has also been an Associate Fellow at the Stanford Humanities Institute. She has been honored with the American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation, the Native American Prize for Literature, and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writer's Circle of the Americas. She lives in Fort Bragg, California.