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Literature essay about native american storytelling
Literature essay about native american storytelling
Narrative essay over native americans
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From the inception of this country, resistance has been the main tool for those who are fighting for their human rights. From slave rebellion at Stono River, North Carolina on September 9, 1739, to the opening shot of the American Revolution in the morning of April 19, 1776 in Lexington, Massachusetts, every violence has been resisted. From the Native American Pontiac rebellion in 1963 to displacement of Indians from their land throughout the Appalachians, which is now called the Midwest in the early nineteenth century, the repression met with strong defiance. Every oppression that was imposed on Native Americans and African-Americas by the British and slave masters was met with resistance. Sherman Alexie’s Flight and Ava DuVernay’s Selma show …show more content…
the struggles of the Native Americans and African-Americans with a government system that was designed to subjugate them. Both Flight and Selma portrayed their people struggle as similar matter, but different goals in mind. Alexie uses a teenager to narrate the Native Americans clashes and what transpired in the movements, DuVernay depicted the movement’s actions and results.
I believe they are similar in their fight to be treated equally as they were portrayed by both Alexie and DuVernay. However, both Flight and Selma used a different method to protest the oppression and tyranny by whites toward Indians and blacks. While the Indians used direct and militant confrontation with the US government to redress the historical injustices, Dr. King led the Civil Rights Movement and used a widely known nonviolent method to fight for sovereignty, cultural preservation, and racial equality. Many Indians fought to prevent the government from invading their sovereign land and resisted being forced on to reservations. Both Flight and Selma used vivid imagery to show the violence of the oppressor. Alexie’s Flight was full of vivid brutal imagery that helps the reader understand the violence to which the native people up against. Zits, the narrator in Flight mysteriously transported back to 1970s in the body of an FBI agent named Hank Storm. When he witnesses, one of the agents describing the Native Americans as “The asshole of America” (Alexie 46). The FBI was responding to the Native American civil right group IRON which prioritized demands the US government to honor …show more content…
treaties. Zits observed two agents pull a young Indian guys off their trunk with their hands tied behind their back, mouth gagged, bloody beaten faces, and all the fingers on their hands are missing. Zits terrified with the obvious sign of torture. When he looks at the agent and saw they were smiling, he said to himself: “They aren’t freedom fighters or anything like that. They don’t care about protecting the poor and defenseless. No, man, these guys just like to hurt people” (52). That makes him wonder how easy it is for the government to kill native people with impunity. Also, in Selma, the local government, specially the police brutalize and terrorize the black community. The local government, which legally can kill a black person without any repercussion backed by Jim Crow laws that socially segregate and economically decimate black community. It also imposed restrictions on voting criteria that lead the African-American community politically powerless. The movement came out these hardships to tackle the discrimination in education, social exclusion, and voting rights. In the movie, Dr. King said to the group of student protesters: “what we do, negotiate, demonstrate and resist and the big part of that to raising white consciousness. In particle the conciseness which the white man happens seating to be the oval office. Right now Jonson has other fish to fry, he will ignore but he can’t. The only way to stop him doing that by being on the front page of the national press every morning, by being on TV news every night” (Selma). African Americans started organizing and resisting the oppression on King’s peaceful principles. Similarly, Native Americans start demanding the government to honor treaties that were made with various Indian nations. Among many things, Native Americans fought against Europeans and the new American government, are to preserve their cultural and traditional religious beliefs.
Most of the challenges facing Indians today are the legacies of those conflicts. Alexie illustrated the consequences of denigration of Native Americans in Flight. Zits again back in time to 1876, the battle of little bighorn in another body of a young Indian boy. He couldn’t believe he was standing right next to the seventh Calvary with George Armstrong Custer. He called Custer “Crazy egomaniac who thinks he’s going to be the president of the United States. Custer is one of the top two or three dumb asses in American history” (Alexie 69). Lieutenant Custer took his army, ignoring his superior officer’s order and attached one of the Indians camps. Cluster underestimated the counter attack of about a thousand Sioux and Cheyenne warriors to his small Calvary. Zits moved up the hills where Cluster and his solders dying. He was surprised when he saw a warrior woman. Zits said: “I never knew Indian women could be a warrior, too” (72). He continues toward the hills and saw the bodies of Cluster soldiers. He states: “Indians were protecting themselves from the soldiers. Cluster had ridden into camp to kill men, women, and children. He has to be stopped” (73). Zits overwhelmed with all the Indian men, women, and children are desecrating the bodies of dead white soldiers. He stands and watch in shock. He turns around and
said: “An Indian grandmother stabbing a soldier with his own bayonet. He’s dead and bloody, but she keeps stabbing him over and over again” (73). They fought back very violently and protected themselves. In contrast, the African-Americans used nonviolent method to resist oppression. As DuVernay showed in Selma, the Civil Rights Movement that was centered in the south where the African American population is concentrated. African-Americans and white allies organized and led the Civil Rights Movement for equal opportunities and racial equality. Since blacks never treated as equals in America, it challenged the beliefs blacks are inferior to whites. This led many whites in the south to terrorize the black community by burning churches with women and children in it. They were plagued with unimaginable brutality from the white community backed by a local laws and ordinances. Even under immense violence on them, they stayed on course and nonviolent. They organized lunch counter sit-ins, marches on City Hall and boycotts merchants to protest segregation laws. The fight for voting rights was very important. One of the reasons to fight for voting rights was, a white person who committed a crime against black person never get convicted because of all white jury. One can not serve on a jury unless he or she is a registered voter. Dr. King and SCLC incite about seven hundred local African-Americans in Selma and said:” it is unacceptable for more than fifty percent of Selma to be Negros, yet less than two percent Negros here been able to vote and determine their destiny as a human being… the local white leadership used their power to keeps away from the ballot box and keep us voiceless. As long as I am unable to exercise my constitutional right to vote, I do not have the command of my own life, I cannot determine my destiny or it’ll determine for me by the people see me suffer than succeed. Those of that gone before as said no more! That means protest, that means march, that means disturb the peace, that means jail, that means risk. We will not wait any longer. Give us the vote! We are not asking we demanding. Give us the vote!” (Selma). After the speech the press scrabble to talk to Dr. King. One of journalist from the New York Times, ask: “are you sure your nonviolence is provoking violence sir?” (Selma). And Dr. King responded: “We are here, we are using our very body to protest, say to those how deny us that we are no longer let them use their Billy clubs and dark corner and hall of power we make do it in glaring daylight Mr. reed” (Selma). Kings determination to be peaceful shown when they were attached by the police led by sheriff Clark Selma in front of the court house. Despite the brutal response and harassment from the authorities and whites who consider African-Americans as an inferior race, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. led the Civil Rights Movement to resist the oppression black people peacefully. The Indians and blacks fought systematic repressions of their people. While both parties fighting for their human rights in different ways, their goals are the same; freedom and equality for their people. My personal understanding of oppression of minorities in this country are correlated with the mind-set of the oppressor. One way the tyrant thinks to maintain the superiority complex for as long as it last or maybe forever, is to deny the rights of others. Today Native Americans have to carry identification card to prove their identity. African-Americans in the south getting their voting rights limited or loss in some cases. I don’t want to see our country going back to those dark days or even worse, so that’s why I am voting for Bernie Sanders for President of the United State America.
The American-Indian documentary film is based on the historical eviction of the Native Americans from their homelands. The documentary is a five part series that span from the 17th to the 20th century beginning with the arrival of the Puritans, the tensions with the Native Americans and their eventual eviction from their homelands. Part III ‘Trail of Tears’ is about tribal debates on how the Cherokee people accepted the policy of assimilation into the Western lifestyle in order to keep their lands and safeguard the Cherokee nation but the white Americas discriminated them regarding them as savages. Their removal was part of Andrew Jackson’s policy to forcefully evict the Indians from the east of the Mississippi River to Oklahoma. The journey is referred to as the ‘Trail of
On December 29, 1890, the army decided to take away all of the Sioux weapons because they weren’t sure if they could trust those indians. Some people think a deaf man did this, but one man shot his gun, while the tribe was surrendering. Studies think that he didn’t understand the Chiefs surrender. The army then opened fire at the Sioux. There was over 300 indians that died, and one of them was their chief named Bigfoot. This is an example of how we didn’t treat Native Americans fairly, because if it was a deaf man then we probably should of talked it out before we killed all those innocent
The Indian Removal Act of 1830 was an abuse of power exerted on the Indian tribes residing in America by the people of the colonies as well as presidents at the time of their removal. Many Indians affected lost their lives, their loved one’s lives’, and the land they thrived on dating back years to their ancestors. This act would be later named “the trail of tears” because of the monumental loss the Indian tribes had endured during their displacement, and the physical and psychological damages of these people (TOTWSR).
They both use the acts of oppression in Birmingham to instigate their feelings. The disparity, though, is that Dr. King experienced the oppressive acts first hand, while Jackson gains passion on the incidents from pictures. Jackson and King share a similar side of extreme anti-segregation, but differ in the way acts of oppression affect them and in their views of who holds the power to control
Although the work is 40 years old, “Custer Died for Your Sins” is still relevant and valuable in explaining the history and problems that Indians face in the United States. Deloria’s book reveals the White view of Indians as false compared to the reality of how Indians are in real life. The forceful intrusion of the U.S. Government and Christian missionaries have had the most oppressing and damaging affect on Indians. There is hope in Delorias words though. He believes that as more tribes become more politically active and capable, they will be able to become more economically independent for future generations. He feels much hope in the 1960’s generation of college age Indians returning to take ownership of their tribes problems and build a better future for their children.
In Lakota Woman, Mary Crow Dog argues that in the 1970’s, the American Indian Movement used protests and militancy to improve their visibility in mainstream Anglo American society in an effort to secure sovereignty for all "full blood" American Indians in spite of generational gender, power, and financial conflicts on the reservations. When reading this book, one can see that this is indeed the case. The struggles these people underwent in their daily lives on the reservation eventually became too much, and the American Indian Movement was born. AIM, as we will see through several examples, made their case known to the people of the United States, and militancy ultimately became necessary in order to do so. "Some people loved AIM, some hated it, but nobody ignored it" (Crow Dog, 74).
“Flight Patterns” is written in a first person narrative point of view, the narrator being William. This lets the reader see the story from William’s perspective, giving them a different lens to see the story and the narrators troubles through. This is an effective tool in this short story because many of the readers do not know the feeling of being racially profiled constantly. Through many examples of minor problems throughout the story, Alexie provides the reader with a basic sense of what issues racial profiling can cause. One of these recurring problems for William is constantly being mistaken for a someone of Middle Eastern descent, rather than an American Indian. This causes different problems, one of them being Muslim taxi drivers constantly asking him if he is Jewish. Another effect of this being William is constantly being pulled aside for ‘random’ pat down searches. While these issues may appear to insignificant the reader at
Although the work is 40 years old, “Custer Died for Your Sins” is still relevant and valuable in explaining the history and problems that Indians face in the United States. Deloria book reveals the Whites view of Indians as false compared to the reality of how Indians are in real life. The forceful intrusion of the U.S. Government and Christian missionaries have had the most oppressing and damaging effect on Indians. There is hope in Delorias words though. He believes that as more tribes become more politically active and capable, they will be able to become more economically independent for future generations. He feels much hope in the 1960’s generation of college age Indians returning to take ownership of their tribes problems.
The American Revolution was a “light at the end of the tunnel” for slaves, or at least some. African Americans played a huge part in the war for both sides. Lord Dunmore, a governor of Virginia, promised freedom to any slave that enlisted into the British army. Colonists’ previously denied enlistment to African American’s because of the response of the South, but hesitantly changed their minds in fear of slaves rebelling against them. The north had become to despise slavery and wanted it gone. On the contrary, the booming cash crops of the south were making huge profits for landowners, making slavery widely popular. After the war, slaves began to petition the government for their freedom using the ideas of the Declaration of Independence,” including the idea of natural rights and the notion that government rested on the consent of the governed.” (Keene 122). The north began to fr...
The removal of Indian tribes was one of the tragic times in America’s history. Native Americans endured hard times when immigrants came to the New World. Their land was stolen, people were treated poorly, tricked, harassed, bullied, and much more. The mistreatment was caused mostly by the white settlers, who wanted the Indians land. The Indians removal was pushed to benefit the settlers, which in turn, caused the Indians to be treated as less than a person and pushed off of their lands. MOREEE
Freedom is defined as “the absence of necessity, coercion, or constraint in choice or action.” Freedom is something that millions take for granted everyday and billions have died throughout history fighting for it. One group whose freedom was unjustly stripped from them were African Americans who were kidnapped from their homes in Africa and shipped to throughout the world to serve as Slaves. Two men who understood what it is like to have their freedom stripped away from them were Nat Turner and Fredrick Douglass. These two men grew up as slaves on southern plantations in the 1800’s, and spent their adulthood fighting for freedom through very different methods. This paper will examine the tactics, effectiveness, and impact of Turner and Douglass
"After the Attica Uprising | The Nation." After the Attica Uprising | The Nation. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Feb. 2014. .
The two men joined the fight for equality for similar reasons. King’s family were terrorized by all the whites in his area, and X’s father. was murdered by the Ku Klux Klan. This inspired and motivated both to challenge the society to be more inclusive. Whilst fighting for the same thing - equality for blacks - the movements they became involved with went about achieving their goals in completely different ways. The Civil Rights Movement is most commonly linked with Martin Luther.
Yet again a troop of soldiers, this time being Lieutenant Colonel George Custer’s seventh Calvary, marched in on the Cheyenne village and began slaughtering them to the tune of “Garry Owen”. Custer being quote “unpopular with a poor record” located a large village of Cheyenne encamped near the Washita River and without even attempting to identify which group of Cheyenne was in the village he sought blood. If Custer’s arrogance hadn’t consumed him, he would have discovered that they were peaceful people and that their village was on reservation soil, where the commander of Fort Cobb had assured them safety. A white flag was even seen flying from a large lodge pole symbolling peace and “that the tribe was actively avoiding conflict”. Custer had his troops surround the peaceful Cheyenne village the night before and once again soldiers charged into a sleeping village. With the village being asleep, caught off guard, and outnumbered the seventh Calvary was able to kill dozens of Cheyenne just in the first few minutes of this so called “battle”. Only a few of the warriors were able to run to the tree line for cover and return fire on the Calvary. However, within just a few hours Custer and his Calvary had managed to completely destroy an entire village killing over a hundred Cheyenne, most were women and
As a prominent philosopher once said, “Kill the Indian and save the man”(Pratt). This quotation substantiates that during the mid 1850s when the US government commenced a movement to repose the Indians from their ancestral lands the overall objective was clearly to “humanize” them. In other words, the displacement was made in order to acculturate the Indians to an American idiosyncrasy, and for the Europeans to secure the lands they yearned for without collision. This justification that the Indians can be segregated from their homeland, and later assimilate the dominant race customs for instance, farming is exceptionally unethical. One can’t be content being constrained to transcend into another culture. The deficiencies of these reservations