Overcoming Stereotypes in the Movie, Dances With Wolves

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Overcoming Stereotypes in the Movie, Dances With Wolves

Everyone has a preconceived opinion of how a certain ethnic group is in terms of the way they live, the morals they hold, the way they deal with people different from them, and how they deal with one another. We come to these conclusions by what we have seen in the media, heard from other people, or actually experienced ourselves. Most people would consider these opinions to be stereotypes. Dances with Wolves is a motion picture that deals with and touches on all sides of personal stereotypes we as American and American Indians have about each other. John Dunbar takes us through and allows us to see how it is to come into a situation he was not familiar with and then eventually the situation became a part of him and his lifestyle. He allows us to experience people for who they really are and not how we assume them to be.

In the beginning of the movie, which takes place in the Great West Plains of North Dakota, we see the main character John Dunbar ride on a horse across enemy lines. While he is galloping through the wide open plains full of his comrades and enemies, you can see the great amount of respect that both sides have for this one brave and courageous man. He gets across the whole plain and then finally falls off the horse in great exhaustion. What this scene does is sets the tone for what type of person John Dunbar is going to be. Going into the rest of the scenes through out the movie I expected this man to be courageous, brave, independent, and willing to try things that seem risky and even life threatening at times.

In the next scene John Dunbar goes to a man of higher ranking to ask him if he could go to the frontier because he realizes that it is not ...

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Even though I had the odds against me I really wanted to find out for myself what I thought of the Indians and the movie. What I found was this movie was very uplifting and really made me realize that even though some of us may have different color skin, or may have a different language we are all still human beings that are not that different from each other. No one of us are better than anyone else, we are all the same. I am very grateful that someone made a movie like this because we all need to realize we can all get alone if we are open minded, willing to try knew things and courageous just like John Dunbar was. This movie and especially John Dunbar have taught me a valuable lesson; we should not judge anyone for what they look like, or for what people say about them because you really need to get to know them for whom they really are.

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