Narrative assessment is traditionally approached from the linear persp
ective of the dominant culture and methods of analysis reflect that bi
as. Other cultures, like the Athabaskan culture, organize narrative th
inking in a different manner. Few tools are available for the more cri
tical understanding of the nonlinear narrative for developmental, clin
ical, and educational purposes. Using story recall, this article exami
nes the Athabaskan narrative as told by a village storyteller to two n
ative students, one of whom has a language-learning disability with a
cooccurring mild hearing loss. The original narrative and the retellin
gs were studied using underlying structure analysis. The prosodic and
structural patterns revealed through the method of assessment were con
sistent with the concept of a spatially organized narrative. Clinical
implications for applying this approach are described as being more se
nsitive to possible interfaces between cultural differences in narrati
ve recall and discourse management problems characteristic of a langua
ge-learning disability.