The alienation elements in Thomas King’s story “Coyote and the Enemy Aliens” demonstrates a different view to see the world, an understanding that cultural and individual identity is not completely suppressed, but can be re-centered and we see this through Coyote’s character. During time we see this character having many different views. Just like many other rights, many tragic and life known events took place because of battle in nations as people were useless while others were treated in a horrible manor that allowed for these terrible events to occur. The aspects characterize the truth that both the government and the nations people were responsible for the alienation of the Japanese and Canadian Aboriginal people faced throughout the story. …show more content…
You think about history, most people do not know much about it. One of the most tragic events that people may or may not know about is world war two. “Soldiers marching, gun shots from morning to night, family members battling and doing what’s best for there country. Parents and children innocent of any crime were moved from their homes, headed to wherever they could go, some even joined the army. For Japan, World War II grew from a conflict historian’s call the Second Sino-Japanese War. The Second Sino-Japanese War began in earnest in 1937 with a battle called the Marco Polo Bridge Incident. Sights from the Japanese internment camps in Canada may not have been aimed towards the ones in the world war but they both shared the extremely outstanding ideas of alienation and innovation. Despite the fact that many people around the world and leaders said that the Japanese post no threat to the Canadian people. That being said, refers to the detainment of Japanese Canadians following the Japanese invasion of Hong Kong and Malaya and attack on Pearl Harbor, and the subsequent Canadian declaration of war on Japan during World War II. This forced relocation subjected Japanese Canadians to government-enforced curfews and interrogations, in addition to job and property losses. When it comes to events such as the Japanese internment camps and the world war it is important that we learn from out mistakes. History has a terrible impulse of repeating itself and in order to grow together we must reflect from them so we don’t make the same mistakes again leading to mistakes made throughout the story that’s viewed the characters through alienation. Coyote is neither a good or bad being.
The Whiteman and Coyote view the Japanese as “Enemy Aliens”, by doing this, the government is starting a plan that separates the Japanese from Canada and try’s to block what they are doing to make it seem more approachable. Coyote clearly sees them right in front of his eyes that they are no different than anyone else yet he disregards this and believes what the Whitemen told him, that the Enemy Aliens are different and deserve to be treated differently. Kusamoto emphasizes this idea when she says, “naming is a dehumanizing tool and a colonial measure, which claims authority and asserts power and control.” (Kusamoto 42.) The next part in the governments plan is to make what they are doing appear to be legal. Laws such as the “Order-in-Council 469” allowed the government, through the Custodian of Enemy Alien Property, to sell Japanese-Canadian property held in protection without owners’ …show more content…
agreement. Coyote’s ignorance does not stop there, while he also alienates the Japanese like the white men tell him to. “Sterling emphasizes the need for reasserting Indigenous mythologies as they do not only help to transform individual pain but also provide an alternative view on history as pointed out in relation to King‘s story. (Kusamoto 127.) This will also influence the telling of the Japanese Canadians‘ experience of the internment. The Japanese mentioned in this story are kept in the Pacific National Exhibition Livestock building and Coyote treats them just as one would the livestock there. The plan plays right into the government’s enforcement of law. This making the people of Canada feel less horrible towards the Japanese people allowed the government to pass tests that would only aid the government on there plan to narrow down on the country. Kusamoto claims there to be a lot of racism involved. Unlike the narrator who seems confused when he is told that the Enemy Aliens aren’t people, coyote accepts this and further imposes this belief.
Coyote is also disappointed later when the Enemy Aliens don't look happy after everything he's done for them. People like the narrator just come to this conclusion to finish the situation. We see this when the narrator is confused as to why they are not people because his eyes tell them they are. Coyote tells him that he is wrong and they look like “Enemy Aliens” leaving the narrator more confused and eventually just accepting the fact that they are not people like him leading to ignorance. It is this ignorance that allowed the Japanese Internment Camps to take place and it is this ignorance that will keep our country and our world to continue this vicious circle. Like King taught education, or us, if we do not use and standing for well and good then it is pointless. Polowski elaborates on this idea when he says, “King shows us that in the end, it does not matter how well we are educated or what our social standing is but rather to what extent we can use that education or standing.” In regards to this quote Polowski emphasizes on a good idea about his ignorance. His ignorance results in him thinking that he is helping them when in fact he took all of their property, split up their families and forced them to live in horrible conditions. King takes up dispossession and internment of Japanese during the war. Many people in positions
of power stood idle when the Japanese Internment Camps took place in Canada. Despite these people being well educated they were unable to see the just point of view or were too frightened to stand up and demand change. Instead the people of Canada just rationalized the idea of the internment camps as an idea that was for the good of the country. Gruber believes if Coyote sounds like a person with stolen goods, then this relates to the government of Canada, when they took the property of the Japanese Canadian internees could not or were not allowed to have. Afterwards sold this property below its value believing them to not be true people, just like the narrator seems confused about Enemy Aliens not being people. Almost all characters show it yet Coyote specifically seems to be the most one shows the most alienation. No one can go against that alienation has occurred in history like we see in story. He fails to discern from friend or foe and in many respects act like the narrator, he trusts the wrong people and he do not seem to be able to recognize the right from wrong. The whitemen are the ones who are controlling the situation throughout the story. Eigenbrod repeats that Billy Frank tells him this story about the Enemy Aliens have their property taken away by Coyote and the Whitemen and get moved from their homes to someplace else reminds me of another story. They are blind to their wrong doings and prefer to cover them up and make other accept them as right. But after all it is not just the Japanese that were being abused. Eigenbrod shows King uses Coyote to view a different time period, which is that all non-white people were potential “terrorists,” making coyote possibly a “terrorist.” Bringing
The Oka Uprising was initially a peaceful protest over the expansion of a golf course on Mohawk territory that turned violent after Quebec’s provincial police, the Sûreté du Québec, responded to the protest with tear gas and flash-bang grenades, eventually escalating to a gun battle between protesters and police. Years after the stand-off, revisionist military historians have praised the Canadian military for avoiding bloodshed because of their “personal commitment [and] calm and attentive approach to native reality,” in which they ought to be commended for “carrying the burden of peace” (Conradi 548). However, Robinson rejects this notion and instead proposes a re-imagining of the Oka conflict through the “adjustment” of First Nations people who fought at Oka with the “bombing of the last Canadian reserve” (Robinson 211). Through “carrying the burden of peace” the Officers are given the power to destroy any semblance of Indigenous tradition, such as the potlatch, and to violently corral all First Nations people to sectioned off “Urban Reserves”. By disrupting popular Canadian perception of law enforcement Robinson succeeds in creating a dystopian image of corrupted power that allows readers to sympathize with the subjection of First Nations people of
Thomas King uses an oral story-telling style of writing mingled with western narrative in his article “You’re Not the Indian I Had in Mind” to explain that Indians are not on the brink of extinction. Through this article in the Racism, Colonialism, and Indigeneity in Canada textbook, King also brings some focus to the topic of what it means to be “Indian” through the eyes of an actual Aboriginal versus how Aboriginals are viewed by other races of people. With his unique style of writing, King is able to bring the reader into the situations he describes because he writes about it like a story he is telling.
The story of Chris McCandless is a long story that is complex to tell in its entirety. This essay will analyze Jon Krakauer’s book, Into The Wild, in an attempt to pursued you that Krakauer did a magnificent job telling McCandless’ story up to his death.
The setting of The Great Arizona Orphan Abduction is based in the 1904 when the Arizona mines and smelters offered ideal incentive for immigrants from Mexico scrambling for a means to life . Around this time, New York nuns brought in 40 Irish orphans to one mining camp in Arizona to stay with Catholic families in the locality a move that was not kindly received by the rest of the Anglos. The underlying perception at the time in Arizona was that Anglos could not mingle freely with any immigrants as they were considered people of colour an understanding that raised racial discrimination to great heights in all operations within the community . Owing to this, the Anglos were furious with the nuns at such ‘betrayal’ and formed a vigilante group to save the community from this great ‘plague’ of immigrant settlement . The vigilantes kidnapped the children and nearly killed the nuns and burned the Catholic Church on whose authority the children had been brought t...
Which makes us question whether he/she is a well implemented metaphor. For example Dr. Alberta Frank’s lecture asking students to come up with interpretation of a particular drawing “Plains Indian Ledger Art” students do not fully comprehend the picture and it’s meaning which in turn emphasizes the fact that students are disassociated with Native traditions (King,p18-21). But it also allows us to consider the fact that trickster is the metaphor of the association that connects the contemporary with the mythic story in the novel. One about is the realistic story of a few Blackfoot Indians who are in identity denial. The four main characters from the contemporary part of the novel are Lionel, Charlie Looking Bear, Alberta Frank and Eli Stands Alone and another which incorporates various creation sequels with the four old Indians (Lone Ranger, Ishmael, Robinson Crusoe, and Hawkeye) who have left a Florida hospital to save Lionel; The elders are each romantically involved with a female character from Native customs (First Woman and the Lone Ranger, Changing Woman and Ishmael, Thought Woman and Robinson Crusoe, and Old Woman and Hawkeye). Just like Coyote these four heroes drift between the narratives that shape the modern part of the novel. Interestingly, these elements are brought together into one narrative that relate to Coyote as he is entrusted with bringing balance, between the two
In Thomas King’s novel, The Inconvenient Indian, the story of North America’s history is discussed from his original viewpoint and perspective. In his first chapter, “Forgetting Columbus,” he voices his opinion about how he feel towards the way white people have told America’s history and portraying it as an adventurous tale of triumph, strength and freedom. King hunts down the evidence needed to reveal more facts on the controversial relationship between the whites and natives and how it has affected the culture of Americans. Mainly untangling the confusion between the idea of Native Americans being savages and whites constantly reigning in glory. He exposes the truth about how Native Americans were treated and how their actual stories were
Nevertheless, in the author’s note, Dunbar-Ortiz promises to provide a unique perspective that she did not gain from secondary texts, sources, or even her own formal education but rather from outside the academy. Furthermore, in her introduction, she claims her work to “be a history of the United States from an Indigenous peoples’ perspective but there is no such thing as a collective Indigenous peoples’ perspective (13).” She states in the next paragraph that her focus is to discuss the colonist settler state, but the previous statement raises flags for how and why she attempts to write it through an Indigenous perspective. Dunbar-Ortiz appears to anchor herself in this Indian identity but at the same time raises question about Indigenous perspective. Dunbar-Ortiz must be careful not to assume that just because her mother was “most likely Cherokee,” her voice automatically resonates and serves as an Indigenous perspective. These confusing and contradictory statements do raise interesting questions about Indigenous identity that Dunbar-Ortiz should have further examined. Are
The article, “Native Reactions to the invasion of America”, is written by a well-known historian, James Axtell to inform the readers about the tragedy that took place in the Native American history. All through the article, Axtell summarizes the life of the Native Americans after Columbus acquainted America to the world. Axtell launches his essay by pointing out how Christopher Columbus’s image changed in the eyes of the public over the past century. In 1892, Columbus’s work and admirations overshadowed the tears and sorrows of the Native Americans. However, in 1992, Columbus’s undeserved limelight shifted to the Native Americans when the society rediscovered the history’s unheard voices and became much more evident about the horrific tragedy of the Natives Indians.
The systematic racism and discrimination in America has long lasting effects that began back when Europeans first stepped foot on American soil is still visible today but only not written into the law. This racism has lead to very specific consequences on the Native people in today’s modern world, and while the racism is maybe not as obvious it is still very present. These modern Native peoples fight against the feeling of community as a Native person, and feeling entirely alone and not a part of it. The poem “The Reservation” by Susan Cloud and “The Real Indian Leans Against” by Chrystos examine the different effects and different settings of how their cultures survived but also how so much was lost for them within their own identity.
Louise Erdrich’s short story “American horse” is a literary piece written by an author whose works emphasize the American experience for a multitude of different people from a plethora of various ethnic backgrounds. While Erdrich utilizes a full arsenal of literary elements to better convey this particular story to the reader, perhaps the two most prominent are theme and point of view. At first glance this story seems to portray the struggle of a mother who has her son ripped from her arms by government authorities; however, if the reader simply steps back to analyze the larger picture, the theme becomes clear. It is important to understand the backgrounds of both the protagonist and antagonists when analyzing theme of this short story. Albetrine, who is the short story’s protagonist, is a Native American woman who characterizes her son Buddy as “the best thing that has ever happened to me”. The antagonist, are westerners who work on behalf of the United States Government. Given this dynamic, the stage is set for a clash between the two forces. The struggle between these two can be viewed as a microcosm for what has occurred throughout history between Native Americans and Caucasians. With all this in mind, the reader can see that the theme of this piece is the battle of Native Americans to maintain their culture and way of life as their homeland is invaded by Caucasians. In addition to the theme, Erdrich’s usage of the third person limited point of view helps the reader understand the short story from several different perspectives while allowing the story to maintain the ambiguity and mysteriousness that was felt by many Natives Americans as they endured similar struggles. These two literary elements help set an underlying atmos...
According to conservative conflict theory, society is a struggle for dominance among competing social groups defined by class, race, and gender. Conflict occurs when groups compete over power and resources. (Tepperman, Albanese & Curtis 2012. pg. 167) The dominant group will exploit the minority by creating rules for success in their society, while denying the minority opportunities for such success, thereby ensuring that they continue to monopolize power and privilege. (Crossman.n.d) This paradigm was well presented throughout the film. The European settlers in Canada viewed the natives as obstacles in their quest of expansion by conquering resources and land. They feared that the aboriginal practices and beliefs will disrupt the cohesion of their own society. The Canadian government adopted the method of residential schools for aboriginal children for in an attempt to assimilate the future generations. The children were stripped of their native culture,...
As a result, both films represent Natives Americans under the point of view of non-Native directors. Despite the fact that they made use of the fabricated stereotypes in their illustrations of the indigenous people, their portrayal was revolutionary in its own times. Each of the films add in their own way a new approach to the representation of indigenous people, their stories unfold partly unlike. These differences make one look at the indigenous not only as one dimensional beings but as multifaceted beings, as Dunbar say, “they are just like us.” This is finally a sense of fairness and respect by the non-native populations to the Native Indians.
It was typical for the men to travel to the north first in order to find a job and set up the life for his family. In the town of San Geronimo, 85% of all men over the age of 15 had left the village in search of work in other parts of Mexico and in the United States. The men would make the trip alone and would send the money that they had made to their wives and children back in the village. The trip to the North was long and very dangerous. For the men who entered the country illegally, the trip could even be deadly. For the men who did have some money, they would hire a “coyote,” a man who would help them cross the border for a price. Sometimes coyotes were legitimate people who sought to help others, while...
This topic is a problem, but it may not be all that it is said to be. Throughout this piece the author shows us what is wrong with system of keeping illegals out of our country. She opens talking of her cousin Bill Pratt, who she claims rode freely from New Mexico to Arizona without disturbances throughout the early 1900’s. From a story of freedom of the past, s...
Thomas King’s Borders portrays the limitations placed on native people in both Canada and the United States. Although multiculturalism is a celebrated trait of both countries, there are limits to the extent which one is able to display personal identity. In the story, the mother is prevented from identifying herself as a Blackfoot woman and instead must decide which broad category she fits into: American or Canadian. The story highlights the difficulty of being forced to conform to the social and cultural norms that one must in order to call oneself a citizen. The Canadian and United States, borders symbolize the restrictions that the government places on minority groups, such as the Blackfoot nation. King’s narrative reveals that governments