Native American literature encompasses oral narratives, historical documents, and contemporary written works produced by Indigenous nations across North America. It provides evidence of cultural continuity, linguistic diversity, and intellectual traditions that predate European contact. As a field of study, Native American literature examines how these texts articulate worldview, social organization, and responses to colonial transformation.

Native American-European Distinctions:

In 1492, the year Christopher Columbus sailed to the New World, the Native population in North America spoke hundreds of languages and maintained societies of diverse forms. Even religious beliefs were distinct among native groups. There is no official count of how many Native American creation stories exist as tribes had/have distinct accounts among them. More distinctions exist, but some may never be known due to the distinctions in literature. Native Americans did not have written literature but instead were strictly oral. The term for this oral tradition is sometimes called orature. This tradition, while certainly culturally and communally focused, leaves a lot of missing information in both Native American values and Native American history, in which archaeological discoveries have become the forefront of that subject.