"Yellow Woman" is probably Silko's most famous story. After it first appeared in The Man to Send Rain Clouds, "Yellow Woman" received immediate attention and praise and was reprinted in a number of other collections. In the introduction to his anthology, The Man to Send Rain Clouds, Kenneth Rosen praises Silko's rich style and her exploration of the intersection between traditional stories and individual voice: "Using Indian lore and history as a kind of counterpoint to her special music, she writes with a depth and intensity that to my mind, set her work apart and mark her as a talent from whom we can expect new, important work."

Some critics have felt that "Yellow Woman" is largely about cultural loss and the need to reconnect to an abandoned spiritual heritage. In Spider Woman's Granddaughters, Paula Gunn Allen observes that the narrator of "Yellow Woman" seems cut...