Zitkála-Šá was born on the Dakota Sioux reservation in South Dakota, the daughter of a Sioux mother and a German-American man. She was given the name Gertrude Simmons Bonnin and used both of her names in her professional career. She was raised by her mother alone and lived on the reservation for the first several years of her life. At age eight, she begged her mother to allow her to attend a mission school in the Eastern United States. Aside from a few trips home, Zitkála-Šá spent the following years studying in grade school and then in college before taking a position as a teacher in an Indian school. She excelled academically, with talents as an orator and violinist.

As she describes in American Indian Stories, Zitkála-Šá grew critical of the idea that American Indians must be assimilated into mainstream US culture. She eventually resigned from her teaching position and began writing essays and stories that covered topics related to Sioux culture and American Indian issues. As her career developed, she worked as a liaison to the US government, advocating for American Indian affairs.

American Indian Stories contains autobiographical accounts of Zitkála-Šá’s youth on the reservation, school years, and professional activities. Moreover, the fiction stories contained in the book also draw upon her knowledge of Sioux culture and the issues the tribe faced at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.