Absolutely True Diary Of A Part-Time Indian

Indians have lived and continue to live a difficult life on the reservation. In Sherman Alexie’s novel, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Indians deal with alcoholism, poverty, violence, and many other hardships. One of the main hardships on the reservation involves poverty. Oftentimes poverty has much affected the community negatively and affecting the communities’ future. For a better future and to escape poverty, Arnold transfers to Reardan. Throughout Arnold’s journey of searching for a better future. Arnold comes to realize the power of his Indian culture, which he can compensate for the communities’ poverty.
The harsh difficulties of poverty has made the reservation feel hopeless. Arnold describes one of the many

poverty has affected reservation, “but we reservation Indians don’t get to realize our dreams. We don’t get those chances. Or choices. We’re just poor. That’s all we are” (Alexie 13). Because poverty has taken a harsh toll on the Indian reservation, living on the reservation is bleak. As Arnold understands, in order for happiness or dreams to be filled, one must have money. If one does not have money, then they are nothing.
Arnold understands that his family is poor, and he has some sense that he will most likely become poor too. But instead of living a miserable and hopeless life for the rest of his life, Arnold feels that he has to do something different with his future. He is tired of feeling so limited and hopeless of the reservation, therefore Arnold makes a change by deciding to leave the reservation. To find hope, Arnold escapes the poverty of Indian Reservation behind.
Arnold initially thinks that he is just physically impoverished, while on the other hand he is mentally impoverished as well. At first, Arnold leaves the reservation with the hope of find a solution to his physical poverty problem, meaning lack of money. He lacks the value or interest for his Indian culture. Arnold discusses how poverty has affected him, “It sucks to be poor, and it sucks to feel that you somehow deserve to be poor. You start believing that you're poor because you're stupid and ugly. And then you start believing that you're stupid and ugly because you're Indian. And because you're Indian you start believing you're destined to be poor..” (Alexie 13) He mixes the problems dealing with poverty along with Indian culture, and almost blames the Indians for why he is poor. He does not fully understand the greater effects of issues, such as manifest destiny that has caused great pains for many Indians. He sees the white community as being fully good. He only sees the negative effects of poverty of the Indian community. To him, poverty is a black and white, either one has money or one does not, that is how much one is worth.
Even though Arnold leaves the reservation, he still deals with poverty in Reardan.

When Arnold is around his Reardan friends, he “...pretended to have a little money...”(Alexie 119). Because at Wellpinit, he did not belong and many of the Indians picked on him, he desperately wanted to feel the sense of belonging to something. But to fit in, Arnold felt that he had to lie about having money. Especially during when his friends and him go out to eat, Arnold learns that "If you let people into your life a little bit, they can be pretty damn amazing."(129). At Wellpinit, to build a strong and trusting relationship with someone was hard for Arnold. On the reservation, physical fights showed how much one was worth, often times then, friends were made because they knew one could fight. White at Reardan, building a relationship with someone for other reasons besides strength was unexpected for Arnold. He realizes that he does not need to lie in front of and can actually trust them because they are his true

friends.
Because Arnold left the reservation and transferred schools, many of the Indians ostracize him for being a traitor.

During Halloween night, Arnold gets an unexpected beating, “They didn’t beat me up too bad. I could tell they didn’t want to put me in the hospital or anything. Mostly they just wanted to remind that I was a traitor”(Alexie 79). At this point, Arnold shockingly does not give up even after a hard beating. He still sticks to his word that, “I have to do this” (Alexie 55). For Arnold, there is no future for him on the Indian reservations. Out of many of the Indians, he is the only who seems to care for his future. In order for a bright future, has to get away from the bad, such as alcohol and the limited

education.
Inspite of being ostracized in the Indian community, Arnold was able to find his true identity. During the basketball season at Reardan Arnold begins to see his self-worth, "But something magical happened to me when I went to Reardan... I suppose it had something to do with confidence. I mean, I’d always been the lowest Indian on the reservation totem pole—I wasn’t expected to be good so I wasn’t. But in Reardan, my coach and the other players wanted me to be good. They needed me to be good. They expected me to be good. And so I became good" (Alexie 181). He finds himself when he is at Reardan. In this way, poverty actually benefited Arnold. The confident and happy kid from Reardan is who Arnold really is. He finally realizes that he does have self-worth. While however, at Wellpinit he was not given a chance to prove himself because he was born already different from the rest of the Indians physically and mentally. The Indians at school did not have enough patience to wait for Arnold to show his physical skills.
Arnold makes his way back to Indian culture by compensating the problems of poverty by finding other values in Indian culture. During Arnold’s grandmother’s funeral, Ted erroneously believed the powwow outfit he had belonged to Arnold grandmother; and when the Indian community laughed, Arnold realizes something about the them, “And I realized that sure, Indians were drunk and sad and displaced and crazy and mean, but dang, we knew how to laugh” (Alexie 166). Arnold’s initial intent to leave the Indian reservation was because poverty and alcoholism were vast in such a small community. He only focused on the hardships of poverty or the limited education, and not necessarily the good things about Indian culture. But during his grandmother’s funeral though, he sees more value in Indian culture, such as when everyone comes together for his grandmother’s funeral. No matter what grudge they had on Arnold, or that they were poor, all of those problems slipped away.
Arnold has overcome many struggles of poverty on the Indian reservation because he was willing to do it for himself, for a better future. He initially he was trying to find a solution for physical poverty, but actually finds a solution for mental poverty, meaning seeing more value in Indian culture. Poverty created a domino effect to all sorts of other issue Arnold was dealing with on the reservation, such as self-identity. Throughout the journey hope has been the driving force that has kept him going. Unlike the many of the other Indians who only dream, Arnold carries out what he wants to do. Throughout Arnold’s journey, he once never quit. He does not want and does not settle for less, he does not deserve it. Sherman Alexie uses the Arnold to inspire readers to persevere even through the hardships in life even if it seems one is the only one going through it.