Essay On Indian Stereotypes

Devin Stanley, Box 568
Prof. Dave Beine
Intercultural Communications 7:45
Assignment #3
19-9-14
Native American/First Nations/Indian Stereotypes
MBI Spokane
Introduction
When I first hear the word Indian or Native American I am instantly transported to the past where the whispery echo of pain filled cries and the shouts of angry men seem to weave in and out of time. Groups of Native Americans were forced away from their homes; their homes reduced to hot ashes and black smoke or more commonly taken over by European settlers. The Indians were pushed out of European society and were involuntary made to walk on the mixture of sharp stone and dusty paths that eventually ended in disease and was quickly followed by death. The thirteenth century to the nineteenth century were the hardest years in history for the Indian tribes with exploitation, foreign diseases, wars, forced displacements, famines, and mass massacres of the Indian tribes. This is where a lot of us think it ends and all the Native Americans now live on reservations, get tons of money from the government, and happily live their life surrounded by narcotic substances while drowning themselves in alcohol to better communicate with Grandmother Willow. I hope that this paper will show us how the Native Americans are very real and still existing in America today. I hope to break down the stereotypes set down by the American

Are they accurate? Would these be constructive/destructive for communication? How did our guest speakers influence your thinking?
The media and school textbooks have tended to depict Native Americans in a stereotypical way. There is the violent drunk, a wise elder, the loyal yet thoughtless sidekick, the Disney Indian princess, or as a severely impoverished group of people. These issues include crude categorizations, glamorizing their culture, and lastly showing Indians in a historical background instead of in the modern