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Alexie Sherman is a Native American novelist born on the Spokane Indian Reservation in Wellpinit, Washington. In his short story, The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven, Alexie Sherman uses a character born in the same Reservation in Washington. This makes the author an authoritive figure and gives him more credibility for the arguments he makes in this short story. The title is allegorical, symbolizing white and Native Americans and their identities. The main argument that the author makes is the way Native Americans are or have been treated in our country, by our government, and its people. The typical stereo types that they have faced, how they are portrayed by most people. This essay touches on a lot of these issues. Flashback is …show more content…
used to think back about experiences the character in the story went through. He also uses a dream, which is an allegorical representation of how he believes people portray him with his girlfriend, insecurities he has in their relationship. This leads to nightmares while he is living with her in Seattle. The nightmares stop when he leaves her and goes back to the Reservation. One experience he talks about in the beginning of the story, he enters a 7/11 store at night and is stared down by the clerk. Another event where he is driving in a nice neighborhood and gets pulled over by the police. This incident, where he gets pulled over supports the authors argument the most. The narrator flashes back, he is driving in a nice neighborhood. He would go on drives, sometimes all night, after he has these big arguments with his girlfriend to cool off. While driving in this nice neighborhood he gets pulled over by a police officer. The police officer questions him and tells him that he doesn’t “fit the profile of the neighborhood”. The police officer then goes on to say to be more careful where he drives and that the people of the neighborhood are getting nervous. Basically, telling him to not drive in this neighborhood because of the way he looks. In this moment, the author uses an emotional experience that many people can relate to. By using this the author reinforces the argument that Native Americans have been victims of profiling and bigotry by people and our government. In this case it is clearly directed toward him as opposed to the 7/11 clerk who may not be profiling him directly, but just someone that is worried, works the graveyard shift and may look at everyone that would enter the store at that hour the same way. This incident is the essay’s strongest supporting argument for making the case about the way Native Americans have been treated. In the beginning Alexie’s character is in Seattle, it is a hot night and he cannot sleep.
He decides to go for a walk and buy a creamsicle from a 7/11 store. As soon as he enters the store the clerk gives him a look that almost made him feel uncomfortable, uneasy and maybe even a little angry. The clerk gave him the “look that he knew so well” as he called it. A look of distrust, a look that you would give a criminal. One would see this as the clerk profiling him because he is an Indian. He then goes on to recall his own experience working the graveyard shift at a 7/11 store. He writes about how he was “robbed once too often” and the last time it happened the thief stole his money, his basketball shoes, and locked him in a cooler. It is as if he does not like to be looked at as a criminal, but at the same time almost giving the clerk free pass to not trust him, or an understanding of why he gave him that look. He describes the clerk at the store as looking the way they all do with acne, white socks, work pants and cheap black shoes that have no support. He describes all 7/11 clerks the same but almost as if exempting himself sometimes. He mentions that they all have the same black shoes, but when he was robbed he had basketball shoes. He then associates the look of distrust with the way his ex-girlfriend looked at him. They would get into big fights and she would tell him that she did not trust him, “You get to …show more content…
angry”. The third incident is a nightmare that he talks about.
He comments about always having crazy dreams, but that his dreams became nightmares since he has been living in Seattle. The nightmare that he had, he goes on to explain that he was a war chief and his girlfriend was a missionary. They were caught by the missionary having intercourse and they shot him. It also supports the authors argument, in the fact that, years of stereo-typing and mistreatment has had a lasting psychological effect on him, and how he thinks other non-Native Americans see him. The dream is an allegorical representation of how he believes people portray him with his girlfriend. As if he is insecure of his relationship, maybe even not supposed to be dating her. The nightmares stop after he breaks up and leaves
her. Alexie Sherman is an authoritive figure when it comes to Native Americans, he writes and expresses his arguments through his character in this essay. The fact that the character just like the author comes from the Spokane Indian Reservation is proof that much of his feelings, beliefs, and experiences are written is this short story essay. The dream he has is allegorical. It says more about the psychological effect that Naïve Americans like him have because of the stereo-types and treatment that they have faced for so long.
Lives for Native Americans on reservations have never quite been easy. There are many struggles that most outsiders are completely oblivious about. In her book The Roundhouse, Louise Erdrich brings those problems to light. She gives her readers a feel of what it is like to be Native American by illustrating the struggles through the life of Joe, a 13-year-old Native American boy living on a North Dakota reservation. This book explores an avenue of advocacy against social injustices. The most observable plight Joe suffers is figuring out how to deal with the injustice acted against his mother, which has caused strife within his entire family and within himself.
Sherman Alexie grew up in Wellpinit, Washington as a Spokane/Coeur d’Alene tribal member (Sherman Alexie). He began his personal battle with substance abuse in 1985 during his freshman year at Jesuit Gonzaga University. The success of his first published work in 1990 incentivized Alexie to overcome his alcohol abuse. “In his short-story and poetry collections, Alexie illuminates the despair, poverty, and alcoholism that often shape the lives of Native Americans living on reservations” (Sherman Alexie). When developing his characters, Alexie often gives them characteristics of substance abuse, poverty and criminal behaviors in an effort to evoke sadness with his readers. Alexie utilizes other art forms, such as film, music, cartoons, and the print media, to bombard mainstream distortion of Indian culture and to redefine Indianness. “Both the term Indian and the stereotypical image are created through histories of misrepresentation—one is a simulated word without a tribal real and the other an i...
One of the hardest realities of being a minority is that the majority has a thousand ways to hurt anyone who is part of a minority, and they have but two or three ways to defend themselves. In Sherman Alexie’s short story The Toughest Indian in the World, Roman Gabriel Fury is a member of the Native American minority that makes up less than two percent of the total United States population (1.2 percent to be exact). This inherent disadvantage of being a minority, along with various cultural factors, influences the conflicted character of Roman Gabriel Fury and his attitudes toward the white majority. Through his use of strong language, demanding tone, and vibrant colors, Roman Gabriel Fury is able to reveal his complex feelings about growing up Indian in a predominately white world.
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.
Foster says that violence is “One of the most personal and even intimate acts between human beings. “ Page 95 The author of Reservation Blues, Sherman Alexia uses so much violence however in different ways. The first way was like how Foster said it was personal. Chess was having a nightmare and in the dream she witnessed a soldier attacking an unpainted indian. “A soldier lunged forward with his bayonet and speared the unpainted one once, twice, three times. The indians gasped as the unpainted one fell to the ground, critically wounded.” Page 85 In the beginning of the dream there had originally been another indian who had started the commotion. Indians were often rash and not only seen as violent however when angry they WERE violent. The soldier was stepping in to “help” the best he could. This dream was personal to Chess because the violence in her dream was a simple way of recalling her father who was not only an indian but often angry and violent because of his large alcohol intake. However Alexie does not stop there. Alexia brings the reader into a more intimate relationship with the characters by describing the fighting and murder of a young indian boy and there horses. In short a young indian was shot from his mount and fell dead and then shortly afterward they shot his horse as well who also died from the bullet. Where it gets
Adjusting to another culture is a difficult concept, especially for children in their school classrooms. In Sherman Alexie’s, “Indian Education,” he discusses the different stages of a Native Americans childhood compared to his white counterparts. He is describing the schooling of a child, Victor, in an American Indian reservation, grade by grade. He uses a few different examples of satire and irony, in which could be viewed in completely different ways, expressing different feelings to the reader. Racism and bullying are both present throughout this essay between Indians and Americans. The Indian Americans have the stereotype of being unsuccessful and always being those that are left behind. Through Alexie’s negativity and humor in his essay, it is evident that he faces many issues and is very frustrated growing up as an American Indian. Growing up, Alexie faces discrimination from white people, who he portrays as evil in every way, to show that his childhood was filled with anger, fear, and sorrow.
Culture has the power and ability to give someone spiritual and emotional distinction which shapes one's identity. Without culture, society would be less and less diverse. Culture is what gives this earth warmth and color that expands across miles and miles. The author of “The School Days of an Indian Girl”, Zitkala Sa, incorporates the ideals of Native American culture into her writing. Similarly, Sherman Alexie sheds light onto the hardships he struggled through growing up on the Spokane Indian Reservation in his book The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven in a chapter titled “Indian Education”.
In “This Is What It Means To Say Phoenix, Arizona,” Alexie creates a story that captures the common stereotypes of Native Americans. For instance, in the story the narrator states, “Who does have money on a reservation, except the cigarette and fireworks salespeople?” (Alexie). This quotation shows that the narrator addresses the idea that all Native Americans must own businesses that sell fireworks and/ or cigarettes in order to be successful. In this example, Victor is shown to not identify with the Native Americans because he does not pursue the same job opportunities as many Native Americans do. Victor's character is used as a contrast to the stereotypes that , there he represents reality. Another instance in which the author incorporates a stereotype about Native Americans is when Thomas-Builds-the-Fire first makes conversation with Victor. Thomas-Builds-the-Fire informs Victor about the news of Victor's ...
“Survival = Anger X Imagination.” Is this equation really true? Well, at least one person thinks it is. In Sherman Alexie’s book The Lone Ranger and Tonto’s Fistfight in Heaven, he gives the equation in order to aid in the understanding of character backgrounds and characteristics. By taking Alexie’s equation on blind faith, it in fact would be quite simple to in some way, shape or form halfheartedly apply to any character and see some sense in doing so. However, when a deeper and more thorough examination takes place it is more inherently apparent that this equation is not fully applicable to all characters in the movie.
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...
The storeowner (no character name; played by Howard Fong) who immigrated to America has had experiences of racism, which made him distrust others; this shows through his interactions with people. The storeowner's legal laws were violated when he wanted to purchase a gun for his family store, in order to have protection against future robbers. Yet, he was prohibited from doing so, based his race and heavy accent. The owner of the gun store made degrading comments about his citizenship and his ability to speak English, and questioned his legal right to buy a gun. The storeowner obviously had been subjected to this type of hostility before, began quarrelling with the man in a d...
The story chronicles situations that illustrate the common stereotypes about Natives. Through Jackson’s humble personality, the reader can grasp his true feelings towards White people, which is based off of the oppression of Native Americans. I need to win it back myself” (14). Jackson also mentions to the cop, “I’m on a mission here. I want to be a hero” (24).
Alexie Sherman’s, “The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven” displays the complications and occasional distress in the relationship between Native-American people and the United States. Despite being aboriginal inhabitants of America, even in present day United States there is still tension between the rest of the country, specifically mainstream white America, and the Native-American population. Several issues regarding the treatment of Native-Americans are major problems presently. Throughout the narrative, several important symbols are mentioned. The title itself represents the struggles between mainstream America and Native-Americans. The theme of racism, violence, and prejudice is apparent throughout the story. Although the author
Sherman Alexie, a Spokane and Coeur d’Alene American Indian, spent his childhood years on the Spokane reservation in Washington but left for high school as well as college with mainly students of the native American origin. The reservation evidently made a vast effect on Alexie’s life as it is demonstrated from one of his earlier book, the 1993 short story compilation The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven. Through this novel, Sherman Alexie forces his audience to question popular culture, identity, humor, as well as history. American Indian identity, as demonstrated in his book, is constructed on the stereotypes existing in TV, films, as well as other media in the popular culture of the US. These stereotypes deter the American Indian
In the Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Sherman Alexie writes the story of Arnold Spirit, a Native American teenager. He is in a family who is not gifted with the things many Americans take for granted, such as a sustainable access to food, or a family that always cares for him. He has many negative experiences along his journey, changing to a different school and learning how to grieve with many deaths, but through all of it, stereotypes and assumptions about who he is make his life miserable. Throughout the story, Alexie uses Arnold’s experiences to showcase how stereotypes and preconceived notions of people and social groups can be a negative impact on lives.