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NATIVE AMERICAN ISSUES.
Term Paper ID:29916
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Essay Subject:
Discusses impact of racism & ethnicity on Native Americans.... More...
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8 Pages / 1800 Words
6 sources, 12 Citations,
MLA Format
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Paper Abstract:
Discusses impact of racism & ethnicity on Native Americans. Compares 2 works of fiction: THE LONE RANGER AND TONTO FISTFIGHT IN HEAVEN, Sherman Alexie's collection of short stories, and Louise Erdrich's novel TRACKS. Contends that all Alexie's stories are pessimintic & cynical with major theme of individual rather than cultural survival. Cites Erdrich's portrayal of Native Americans continuing their struggle to maintain their cultural heritage as containing more subtleties of life & complexi6y of narrative & structure than Alexie's stories.
Paper Introduction:
This study will discuss race and ethnicity, specifically issues related to Native Americans, in two works by Native American writers, Sherman Alexie's The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven and Louise Erdrich's Tracks. While both works of fiction fully accept the negative consequences of bias and bigotry exercised against Native Americans, Alexie's stories are far more dark and blunt, while Erdrich's novel is far more subtle and nuanced.
The title story in Alexie's collection of stories takes a deeply pessimistic perspective on the life of Native American characters. All of the stories, and especially the title story, are pessimistic, even cynical, though if one looks hard enough there are some signs of hope, such as the narrator's year of sobriety. However, that sobriety does not address the racism
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. It may well be thatthe sarcasm which attends such references to the history of AmericanIndians allows him to keep a connection with that past without becoming toodepressed about the loss of that tradition in his own life. The Indians are helpless victims. Both authors, in their different styles,refuse to portray Native Americans in a false light of hope or optimism. . His idea of Heaven (orthat of his protagonist) might be a full, violent exposure of the hatredand/or injustice between the whites and American Indians? Nanapush addresses . Flavin notes the subtlety of Erdrich's interweaving of charactersfrom different generations, and the implications of that interweaving forthe culture. Clearly, the author means the reader to feeluncomfortable looking at the harsh truth of his characters' lives and thefact that many victims of racism in one form or another live in a worldwhere nobody trusts anybody else. "Bold, Sexy Stories From Alexie." San Francisco Chronicle,May 21, 2 , 1-4.Scott, Joanna. On the one hand, we are drawn into the story of Fleur and her attempts to save the land. On the other hand, Foster, writing of Alexie's reference to anothercharacter in another story, quotes the author: "He was a white man, andtherefore he could dream" (Foster 3). (Scott 2). The novel begins with a paragraph roughly summarizing the sufferingof Native Americans through racism, disease, broken treaties, and even theweather, which seems determined to destroy them: We started dying before the snow, and like the snow, we continued to fall. The dream comes true. This study will discuss race and ethnicity, specifically issuesrelated to Native Americans, in two works by Native American writers,Sherman Alexie's The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven and LouiseErdrich's Tracks. One cannot keep from comparing such layering of narration andinterrelationship on the part of Erdrich and the far less subtlepresentation and narration of Alexie. Flavin writes about Erdrich's portrait of this fight for survival andthe role of storytelling in that struggle: In the Nanapush sections of Tracks, Erdrich focuses on communication . The stories in this collection are honest in their refusal towhitewash the depressing nature of a life of a poor man of an ethnicminority that has suffered bigotry of every form in the past, and stillsuffers from racism today. . . The soldiers arrive, randomly kill and terrorize the people on the reservation and gather up the survivors. New York: Henry Holt, 1988.Foster, Ken. Works CitedAlexie, Sherman. The Lone Ranger and Tonto are allies, onewhite and dominant, one American Indian and subordinate. Nanapush is re-creating the history of the family unit, hoping that his story ill re-unite the family for the sake of the future (Flavin 5). The important part of the passage is that the narrator avoids writingthe name and "stor[ing] it in a government file." In that sense, thenarrator recognizes the destructive intentions of the white governmentwhich seeks to exploit, subjugate and/or destroy (if necessary) the NativeAmericans and their culture. There's nothing surprisingor disappointing in that. It was surprising there were so many of us left to die. Flavin notes the complexity of the narrative and structure ofErdrich's novel: Erdrich manages in the dramatic situation of the novel to create two levels of action. Primarily because of the impact of bigotry against Native Americanswhich has created a world of disappointment and disadvantage, the narratorends his account on a hopeless note, despite his hard-won sobriety: "It maytake hours, even years, for me to sleep again. I know how all my dreams end anyway" (Alexie 28). . . 1-12. "Sherman Alexie." MiraCosta College.http://www.miracosta.cc.ca.us/home/gfloren/alexie.htm. . May 21, 2 .http://search1.nytimes.com/search/daily/bin/ fastweb?getdoc+book-rev+bookrev-cur+5 15+5+wAAA+alexie. NewYork: HarperPerennial, 1994.Erdrich. 1-8.Flavin, James. . Tracks. Leaving aside the fact that Erdrich is a much more accomplishedwriter and observer of the subtleties of human life and relationships thanis Alexie, it is clear that both focus on the negative effects of racism onthe lives of Native Americans. InErdrich's novel, the battle still rages. . This reader does not have thatsame sense in Alexie's stories, which seem to emphasize the individualalienated from both Native American and white cultures. The story portrays the grittiness of lifeand the helplessness of the protagonist to change his surroundings,although his sobriety shows that he at least can change himself. Oddly, the title--The Lone Ranger and TontoFistfight in Heaven--seems to promise energy, action, and a dramatictelling of an exciting story, promises not forthcoming. Lulu's mother is Fleur [and] Lulu will not refer to her as "mother." . All his dreams for a better life have ended badly, just as his actualdreams at night end with such horrors as the head of a dead American Indianbeing used as sport by whites. He issober, but he is not happy, and that unhappiness is due in large part tothe fact that he still lives in a racist society that sees him as a second-class citizen at best. The reader has the sense in Alexie that the cultural battle islost, that only an individuals can have small victories over extinction. Erdrich, on the other hand, portrays in Tracks the continuing andintense struggle Native Americans have in maintaining their connection withtheir cultural heritage. That is why I only gave it out once in all those years"(Erdrich 32). Not all of this distrust isthe result of racism, but racism is certainly a major part of the worldportrayed by Alexie: Against a backdrop of alcohol, car accidents, laughter, and basketball, Alexie depicts the distances between Indians and whites, reservation Indians and urban Indians, men and women, and mostly poetically between modern Indians and the traditions of the past (Floren 4). Alexie's title,however, has them as battling enemies--and in Heaven--equals in battleagainst one another as they had not been as allies. Her novel "signals the potentialfor cultural survival or destruction" (Flavin 7), survival or destructionof the individual, the family, and the entire culture. . . . The reader might not be interested in the downtrodden characters inAlexie's stories, but the author clearly believes that they deserve to beportrayed, and to be portrayed honestly, without adornment, without falsehope, so that the reader can see what the impact of racism against NativeAmericans has been, and so that many poor Native Americans can see theirown lives portrayed honestly. "Good" dreams are beyond the realm of thecharacter, as representative of the modern American-Indian. his granddaughter, Lulu. The stories are full of references to "traditions of the past,"although in most cases those references are tinged with sarcasm, as when herefers to "war paint and sharp arrows," symbolically imagining himself incruel verbal fights with his girlfriend (Alexie 25). "American Revolutions." New York Times. . The American Indian might fight it, might rage against it, but,at least in this story, he will not emerge victorious against it. The protagonist in thisparticular story is haunted by dreams that combine the horrors of anti-American-Indian racism from the past and the more subtle form of that sameracism in the late 2 th century. Nothing can be done to bring back the oneswho disappeared before such racism, but keeping their memories alive insuch storytelling honors their lives, their deaths, and their enduringspirits. The point here is not simply that the name is written, for,as Flavin points out, Erdrich herself writes the name many times in thebook. 1-3.Floren, Gloria. Nanapush concludes:"I'd bring old times back, force them to reckon, make them look into oneanother's eyes again. For those who survived the spotted sickness from the south, our long fight west to Nadouissioux land where we signed the treaty, and then a wind from the east, bringing exile in a storm of government papers, what descended from the north in 1912 seemed impossible (Erdrich 1). . within the Anishinaabe culture to explore the relationship between communication and whose oral traditions are central to its survival. You don't fit the profile of theneighborhood.'" The narrator says, "I wanted to tell him that I didn'treally fit the profile of the country but I knew it would just get me intotrouble'" (Alexie 24). ."(Erdrich 1). "The Novel as Performance: Communication in Louise Erdrich's Tracks." Studies in American Indian Literatures. However, that sobriety does not address theracism faced by Native Americans, but rather seems to say that if NativeAmericans are to overcome race-based disadvantages and survive, it will beon an individual basis. (Flavin 1-2). The only dreamsthe narrator knows are "bad" dreams and he knows how they end, just as heknows that his waking dreams about a dramatically better life will end indisappointment. Volume 3, Number 4, Winter 1991. The irony is clear: it was the country of the NativeAmericans, and now they do not even "fit the profile" of that country. Alexie writes simply and starkly, even crudely, of the despair andloss of hope of Native Americans in the urban environment, with minimalsigns that there is any deep connection remaining with the culture of theirpast. Still, to be fair, Alexie may mean that small victories overdepression, over hopelessness, over racism, over alienation, overalcoholism and indolence, are possible and important in the survival ofindividual human beings whose people have been historical victims of a farmore powerful force of destruction and genocide. On the other, at the level of the frame created by the narrator/narratee relationship, we are engaged in Nanapush's narrative, wondering if it will have the desired effect of reuniting mother and daughter and keeping Lulu within her native culture. American Indians and whites distrust oneanother; family members distrust one another; lovers distrust one another'customers and cashiers distrust one another. . While both works of fiction fully accept the negativeconsequences of bias and bigotry exercised against Native Americans,Alexie's stories are far more dark and blunt, while Erdrich's novel is farmore subtle and nuanced. The people face tremendous onslaughts from every direction, but thereremains in Erdrich a sense that the people are still fighting to staytogether, as a people and as family units. http://www.richmond.edu/faculty/ASAIL/SAIL2/34.html#1----------------------- 1 In that way, the oral traditionpassed down though the generations keeps alive the culture, maintainsfamily and historical connections, and continues to recognize the evil doneby whites in the name of racism. Erdrich has Nanapush, one of the two narrators in the novel, say,"Nanapush is a name that loses power every time it is written and stored ina government file. . The message is clear that "theones who disappeared" did not merely die but were the victims of the racistgovernment which sought to destroy the Native Americans and their cultureand steal the land for their own purposes. The reader is immediately taken intothe Native American culture in Erdrich's novel, into those relationships,which show that the culture is still alive, despite the destructive resultsof racist policy for hundreds of years by Europeans and their ancestors. The "dreams" of which the narrator speaks of at the end of the storyare a crucial part of Alexie's fictional realm. that his narrative will allow Lulu to understand the importance of the culture which she seems destined to abandon for the white culture. . The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven. . In Erdrich there is none of the cynicism which marks Alexie'sstories. . . Louise. On the first page of the novel, Erdrich has Nanapush speakdirectly to Lulu, focusing on trying to maintain the connection amongliving generations as well as the connection between the living and thespirits of the dead: "Granddaughter, you are the child of the invisible,the ones who disappeared . The title story in Alexie's collection of stories takes a deeplypessimistic perspective on the life of Native American characters. The title isobviously meant to be ironic. Nanapush hopes that his narrative will bring mother and daughter together again, or . . Scott writes of another story in the collection: The narrator, a young Indian boy, dreams that soldiers come to devour his people. . I'd work a medicine (Erdrich 21 ). All ofthe stories, and especially the title story, are pessimistic, even cynical,though if one looks hard enough there are some signs of hope, such as thenarrator's year of sobriety. The message is clear: this is a whiteman's world, in the late 2 th century, just as it was in the 18th and 19thcenturies. . The main character in the title story is stopped by the police:"'Well, you should be more careful where you drive,' the officer said.'You're making people nervous.
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