Culture 4: Native American Literature

A.  BIBLIOGRAPHY

Alexie, Sherman. 2007. Ill. by Ellen Forney. THE ABSOLUTELY TRUE DIARY OF A PART-TIME INDIAN.  NY, New York: Little, Brown. ISBN 9780316013680

B.  PLOT SUMMARY

THE ABSOLUTELY TRUE DIARY OF A PART-TIME INDIAN by Sherman Alexie is a semiautobiographical account of Alexie’s teenage years on a Spokane Indian reservation. Alexie’s story is told by Arnold Spirit, AKA Junior, a fourteen year old promising cartoonist. Junior begins life with a battery of medical problems; this causes him countless trials and tribulations throughout his adolescence. Junior faces life’s demands and struggles with humor and intellect. Alexie’s story is a testament to Junior’s strong ability to persevere and be successful in the course of difficult times.

C.  CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)

THE ABSOLUTELY TRUE DIARY OF A PART-TIME INDIAN journals the life of a fourteen year old Spokane Indian, named Arnold Spirit, Jr. Junior, as he is called by his family and friend, is an avid reader and talented cartoonist. Junior is born with encephalitis and has a string of disabilities. He is the persistent mark of bullies on the “rez.”  He has one best friend named Rowdy, who is his angry bodyguard. On Junior’s first day of high school, he realizes that his geometry book is the one that his mother used when she attended the reservation school, over thirty years ago. In rage, Junior hurls the geometry textbook at Mr. P and breaks his nose. As a result, Junior is suspended by the school. Recognizing Junior's aptitude, Mr. P suggests to his family that he transfers to a school twenty two miles away, which happens to be a well-to-do farm town where the only other Native American is the team mascot. Junior tires of his life on the reservation and wishes that this new school will provide him with a better education and an opportunity to move away from the impoverished conditions on the reservation. 

Junior anticipates adversity when he transfers from the reservation school to the school in Reardan, but soon finds himself making friends with the popular students, the nerds, and he becomes the star player on the varsity basketball team. The story reaches a climax when Junior returns to his former school to play a basketball game against his friend Rowdy. 

Throughout Sherman Alexie’s book, the reader is provided with an array of recognizable Spokane Indian cultural markers. For example, the author offers details relating to the setting, customs, dress, and symbols. The setting of the story is contemporary and takes place in the year 2006.  Junior offers the time, place and physical location of the story, when he shares his thoughts concerning his relationship with his best friend Rowdy. Junior states, “Both of us were pushed into the world on November 5, 1992, at Sacred Heart Hospital in Spokane . . . I figure Rowdy and I have spent an average of eight hours a day together for the last fourteen years. That’s eight hours times 365 days times fourteen years.” Further, Junior offers, “Reardan is the rich, white farm town that sits in the wheat fields exactly twenty-two miles away from the rez . . . Wellpinit, that smaller, Indian town,” and “I was setting in a freshman classroom at Wellpinit High School.”   In addition to the cultural markers of the Spokane  Indian's culture and traditions, social, and economic status of the characters, the reoccurrence of alcoholism is a resounding cultural marker in the book. Throughout the story, Junior is faced with the debilitating influence of alcoholism, which overshadows the lives of his family and friend. For example, in one year, Junior loses his grandmother to a drunken driver, his sister to a drunken blackout, during a house fire, and his father's best friend Eugene. Eugene is killed by Bobby. Bobby is Eugene’s drinking buddy. Junior states, “When Bobby was sober enough to realize what he’d done, he could only call Eugene’s name over and over, as if that would bring him back. A few weeks later, in jail, Bobby hung himself with a bed sheet.” Overcoming Adversity is another cultural marker in the book. In his love of drawing, Junior finds an outlet to endure his painful existence on the reservation. Junior states, “I think the world is a series of broken dams and floods, and my cartoons are tiny little lifeboats.”  Further, ethnic identity and racism is a prevalent cultural marker in this novel. While Junior’s parents support his decision to attend school in Reardon, the people on the reservation view him as a traitor, an apple, "red on the outside and white on the inside.” Moreover, while at Reardon, the majority of the teachers and students stereotype him. Junior shares, "When I am in Reardon, I am half Indian, and when I am  in Wellpinit, I am half white.” Junior offers, “It was like being Indian was my job, but it was only a part-time job. And it didn’t pay well at all.”
 Poverty is a cultural marker in this story, as well. Junior struggles with trying to escape a life of extreme poverty. For example, when Junior’s dog Oscar gets sick and there is no money to see a veterinarian, Junior’s dad has to shoot the dog. Junior states, "Dad just looked down at me with the saddest look in his eyes. He was crying. He looked weak. I wanted to hate Dad and Mom for our poverty.”

Ellen Forney’s illustrations contain elements suitable and significant to the story that helps to bring the characters alive for the reader. Ellen Forney's straightforward pencil cartoons correspond perfectly within the story and display the promising artist blossoming within Junior. Forney's drawings, appearing throughout the novel, enhance the text and could exist alone to convey Junior's story. The illustrations guide the reader and presents an accurate portrayal of Junior's life on and off the Spokane reservation. Ellen Forney's illustrations offers the reader an alternative perspective into Junior's turbulent existence and a different medium of expression for Alexie's  multidimensional protagonist.

D. REVIEW EXCERPTS  

Booklist

“Alexie's humor and prose are easygoing and well suited to his young audience, and he doesn't pull many punches as he levels his eye at stereotypes both warranted and inapt. A few of the plotlines fade to gray by the end, but this ultimately affirms the incredible power of best friends to hurt and heal in equal measure. Younger teens looking for the strength to lift themselves out of rough situations would do well to start here.”

BookPage

“Sherman Alexie's first novel for young adults is funny, self-deprecating and serious all at once. With his perceptive narrator, Alexie deftly taps into the human desire to stand out while fitting in.”

Horn Book Magazine

“The line between dramatic monologue, verse novel, and standup comedy gets unequivocally -- and hilariously and triumphantly -- bent in this novel about coming of age on the rez.”

Kirkus Reviews

“Alexie nimbly blends sharp wit with unapologetic emotion in his first foray into young-adult literature. “

Library Media Connection

“Author Sherman Alexie writes with humor and wit. The story is bittersweet and intense; events are sometimes shocking, but the author does an excellent job of keeping the novel moving at an interesting pace. Reluctant readers would enjoy the changes of fonts and the humor of our not-so-mainstream hero.”

Publishers Weekly

“Screenwriter, novelist and poet, Alexie bounds into YA with what might be a Native American equivalent of Angela's Ashes, a coming-of-age story so well observed that its very rootedness in one specific culture is also what lends it universality, and so emotionally honest that the humor almost always proves painful.

 Jazzy syntax and Forney's witty cartoons examining Indian versus White attire and behavior transmute despair into dark humor; Alexie's no-holds-barred jokes have the effect of throwing the seriousness of his themes into high relief.”

School Library Journal

“Alexie's tale of self-discovery is a first purchase for all libraries.”

Voice of Youth Advocates

“Alexie's portrayal of reservation life, with the help of a great lineup of supporting characters, is realistic and fantastical and funny and tragic-all at the same time.”

E.  CONNECTIONS

According to Sherman Alexie, “Teenagers, of every class, color and creed, feel trapped by family, community and tribal expectations. And teenagers have to make the outrageous and heroic decision to re-create themselves.” Students may find the following books that relate to their ever evolving lives of interest:

Alder, Elizabeth. 2002. CROSSING THE PANTHERS PATH. ISBN 978037416627 

Carvelle, Marlene. WHO WILL TELL MY BROTHER. ISBN 9780786816576

Eskilsen, Erik. 2004. OFFSIDES.  ISBN 9780618462848

Mikaelsen, Ben. 2005. TOUCHING SPIRIT BEAR. ISBN 9780060734008

Myers, Walter Dean. 2007. STREET LOVE. ISBN 9780064407328

Smelcer, John .2006.THE TRAP. ISBN 9780805-79395
Smith, Cynthia Leitich. 2001. RAIN IS MY INDIAN NAME. Ill. by Lori Earley. ISBN  9780688173975
Soto, Gary. 2006. BURIED ONIONS. ISBN 9780152062651

A.  BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bruchac, Joseph. 2005. CODE TALKER: A NOVEL ABOUT THE NAVAJO MARINES OF WORLD WAR TWO. NY, New York: Dial Books. ISBN 9781428182974

B.  PLOT SUMMARY

In Joseph Bruchac’s CODE TALKER: A NOVEL ABOUT THE NAVAJO MARINES OF WORLD WAR TWO, the protagonist in the story is Ned Begay.  At the age of six, Ned Begay is sent to a mission boarding school to learn English and the ways of the “white man.” During his mission stay, Begay is taught that the Navajo language is worthless and he is brutally disciplined for speaking it.  Ironically, at the age of sixteen, Ned Begay and other Navajo men are recruited by the Marine Corps for a top-secret task to become code talkers. Throughout World War Two, the code talkers saved numerous American lives and were a vital part of the war by sending messages back and forth in an unbreakable code, using the Navajo language.  

C.  CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)

The story of the Navajo code talker is told by a grandfather relating his tale of being a Navajo code talker to his grandchildren.  In the unhurried nature of a Native Indian storyteller, Joseph Bruchac assumes the role of  the Navajo grandfather, who tells his grandchildren about his life before, during and after World War Two as a code talker. Ned Begay, the Protagonist in the novel, begins his story with his early childhood education at “Rehoboth Mission," at the tender age of six.  Ned Begay, aka Kii Yazhi, describes the customs, traditions, symbols, and dress of the Navajo people. For example, Kii Yazhi, shares, “Like me, those boys and girls were wearing their finest clothing. Their long black hair glistened from being brushed again and again by loving relatives. The newest deerskin moccasins they owned were on their feet. Like me, many wore family jewelry made of silver, inset with turquoise and agate and jet. Our necklaces and bracelets, belts and hair ornaments were a sign of how much our families loved us, a way of reminding those who would now be caring for us how precious we were in the eyes of our relatives.”   

In the beginning of the book, Ned Begay notes the cultural markers of the Navajo family customs and traditions, character's names, physical environments, and speech patterns to the reader.  For instance, ,“Suddenly, as if everyone had remembered their manners all at once, we began to introduce ourselves to each other as Navajos are always supposed to do. We said hello, spoke our names, told each other our clan and where we were born and shows us how to grow. By knowing each other’s clan-the clan of the mother that we were born to, the clan of the father that we were born for-we can recognize our relatives . . .’Yaateeh,’ a tall Navajo boy with a red head band said to me. 'Hello. I am Many Horses. I am born to Bitter Water Clan and born for Towering House. My birthplace is just west of Chinle below the hills there to the west.’ ‘Yaateeh. I am Kii Yazhi. I was born for Mud Clan and Born to Towering House. My birth place is over near Grants. I am the son of Gray Mustache.’”  
Ned's mother and father's language patterns are shared with the reader, when Ned visits home and asks his mother and father to allow him to enlist in the Marines: "Son, 'my mother said, 'wait outside while your father and I talk of this.'" "Son, my father said, 'we are proud of you. What you want to do is a good thing. However, your mother and I both think that you are not yet old enough. You are still too young to become a Marine. Wait through another winter. If this was is still going on, then we will give you our blessing to join up." 

Another cultural marker in the book is the specific references to the traditional Navajo ceremonies. For example, although Ned and his family is Catholic, they practice the Navajo ceremonies. For instance, before Ned leaves for boot camp, his parents insist that he gets the protection of  “Hozhooji” the Blessingway. He states, "I had to go with my parents to a protection of 'Hozhooji' the Blessingway, I might be kept safe when I went into danger. I was glad to do that. The Blessingway is done for all that is good. That is it's only purpose." Further,  Ned uses the ceremonial corn pollen for pray. He shares, "I stood facing the rising sun. I took corn pollen from the pouch I always carried at my waist, touched it to my tongue and the top of my head, then lifted it up the four sacred directions as I greeted the dawn. That pouch stayed with me whereever I went during the war. The blessing of that corn pollen helped keep me calm and balanced and safe. Next, Ned sends his dirty fatigues home to stand in for him during the protection ceremony. He writes, "Dear Parents. Here are my clothes, still stained with the sweat and mud and blood of Bougainville. Please use these to stand for me in a protection ceremony." Ned explains, "On the day when prayers and songs would be offered to ask help for me, my clothes would be there, in the hands of my family. On that day I would feel the presence of the Holy People, even though I was an ocean away from my home."
CODE TALKER: A NOVEL ABOUT THE NAVAJO MARINES OF WORLD WAR TWO is a well written novel that will leave its readers wanting to learn more about the code talkers. 

D.  REVIEW EXCERPTS

Booklist

“The narrative pulls no punches about war's brutality and never adopts an avuncular tone. Not every section of the book is riveting, but slowly the succession of scenes, impressions, and remarks build to create a solid, memorable portrayal of Ned Begay.”

Horn Book Guide

“Unconvincingly framed as reminiscence that a WWII veteran share with his grandchildren, this novel is larded with military history, information about the Navajo code-talkers, and awkwardly set passages about the beauty and natural wisdom of Navajo life. There is no plot, characterization is generic, and while real people are part of the story, their dialogue is fictionalized and unlikely.”

Kirkus

“With its multicultural themes and well-told WWII history, this will appeal to a wide audience.“

Library Media Connection

“Told from the perspective of a grandfather telling the history to his grandchildren, Bruchac's voice as a master storyteller weaves stories, characters, and research into a compelling story of war, sacrifice, and personal journey. Heavily researched, this is a novel of still little known part of history within a culture and the larger United States that will leave readers with a different perspective of World War II.”

School Library Journal

“Bruchac's gentle prose presents a clear historical picture of young men in wartime, island hopping across the Pacific, waging war in the hells of Guadalcanal, Bougainville, and Iwo Jima. No sensational and accurate, Bruchac's tale is quietly inspiring, even for those who have seen Windtalkers, or who have read such nonfiction works as Nathan Aaseng's Navajo Code Talkers (Walker, 1992), Kenji Kawano's Warriors: Navajo Code Talkers (Northland, 1990), or Deanne Durrett's Unsung Heroes of World War II: The Story of the Navajo Code Talkers (Facts On File, 1998). For those who've read none of the above, this is an eye-opener.”

Voice of Youth Advocates

“Ned tells his own story in simple, measured prose, as a grandfather's tale to his grandchildren. The author never allows his lovely and poignant novel to become a polemic against the mindless abuse of the mission schools or the horrors of war in the Pacific, but he instead offers a portrait of a brave and generous man who represents any teenager caught in the forces of history. This fine novel should find a place in all collections serving young adults.”

E.  CONNECTIONS

Tell students to work together to create messages using the dictionary. Then tell groups to exchange papers to decode one another's messages.  Give students an example of how the code might work. (For example, boy in Navajo code might be "shush ne-ahs-jah tsah-as-zih." Shush is the Navajo word for "bear"; ne-ahs-jah is the Navajo word for "owl"; and tsah-as-zih is the Navajo word for "yucca." If you take the first letter of each translated word, those letters spell boy.)

The above activities are taken from the EducationWorld web site: http://www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/00-2/lp2213.shtml

Other books by Joseph Bruchac:
Bruchac, Joseph. 2007. BEARWALKER. ISBN 9780061123092
Bruchac, Joseph. 2005. WHISPER IN THE DARK. ISBN 978006580872

A. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Begay, Shonto. 1995. NAVAJO: VISION AND VOICES ACROSS THE MESA. NY, New York: Scholastic INC. ISBN 9780590461535 

B. PLOT SUMMARY

Shonto Begay collection of poetry offers the reader an extraordinary glimpse into the world of the Navajo. Begay’s book of poems is coupled with twenty of his most remarkable paintings. Shonto Begay's story book transports the reader from the spiritual, into his childhood and ending with a tribute to life and rebirth. 

C.  CRITICAL ANALYSIS (INCLUDING CULTURAL MARKERS)

In Shonto Begay’s picture book, the reader is presented with a collection of authentic Navajo cultural markers. For example, Begay provides the reader with realistic settings, customs, dress, and symbols of the Navajo people. Moreover, Begay’s illustrations are appropriate and meaningful and enhance the story. 

In NAVAJO: VISION AND VOICES ACROSS THE MESA, Shonto Begay creates an anthology of prose and free verse poetry from the viewpoint of a modern day young Native American. He teams his stunning oil paintings with his strong and polished poetry. Begay's poetry reveals many facets of his personal life and culture, which is  a very unique and interesting. Begay shares, “The paintings and poems in this book explore facets of Navajo life that are rarely touched upon in Western literature. They will take you into the corners of my world, the Navajo world, so that you may experience daily life on the mesa in the twentieth century. You will also feel the echoes and reverberations of the way things were here on the mesa many hundreds of years before Columbus.”  Further, in Begay’s introduction, he states, “I live in a dual society like many in my generation of Navajo. We extract from the past to maintain harmony within. We acknowledge the present and the high-tech world we have been thrust into” He adds information about his own home, a hogan, with a “telephone, cable television, and fax machine” From the start to the final page of his picture book, Begay offers the reader an personal invitation into his world.

Begay helps the young reader by beginning with poetry that explores the Navajo storytelling tradition and the Creation story. At the onset, the poems seem to reflect the imagination and wide eyes of a youngster, although all of the poems are from the perspective of an adult looking back. Along with illustrations that incorporate suspended illusory images in “Echoes” and “Creation,” the reader will be eager to read more. He deals with his own conflicts between the old and new customs and traditions as can be seen in the poem “Storm Pattern.” In this poem about his mother, Begay describes how he sat next to her as she quilted. He shares, “I told her of strange new images, I had seen in magazines, I tried in vainto talk her into weaving these, new designs. She would smile and tell me she could not.”

Begay flawlessly combines the cultural markers of the Navajo language in his poems, with both phrasing and actual Dine words. He uses Dine words sparingly, and offers meaning within the context in all areas. Such integration of Dine can be seen in the poem “Mother’s Lace” in which Begay describes authentic cultural markers of rituals, ceremonies and customs and traditions with the following verse: “As the sun blazes up from the mesa top, I sprinkle my corn pollen, tracing the path of the sun, as prayer silently leaves my lips. Prayer of humility, prayer for another day. Prayer for family, for animals, for travelers. Prayer especially for hózhó, for harmony. My prayer is strong today.”  In “Anasazi Diaspora,” Begay offers the reader cultural markers of the Navajo names of his family: “’Shi cheii, My Grandfather, where did the Anasazi people go?, ‘Shi’ tsoi, My Grandson, the Anasazi had to leave this land long before Dinéh, the Navajo people, came into the Fourth World." Begay’s poetry and illustrations complement one another. The paintings offer immense variety in colors like the elements of the earth.

Review Excerpts
Horn Book Guide

“Twenty of Begay's beautiful, evocative paintings accompany his original poetry describing some of the emotions, stories, and experiences shared in his Navajo community. Some of the poems are lengthy and are more suitable for an older audience. An index of paintings is appended.”

Publishers Weekly

“With these heartfelt paintings, poems and memoirs, the noted Navajo artist fulfills his stated goal of taking the reader . . .into the corners of my world, the Navajo world.'' Similar in conception to George Littlechild's This Land Is My Land, this book places more emphasis on the traditional and spiritual, its contemporary setting notwithstanding. The sacred intertwines with the everyday; topics here range from storytelling, a solar eclipse and a healing ritual to riding in a truck and attending a tribal fair. Begay also explores the constant struggle for balance between his two worlds, as in Storm Pattern,  where he recalls his mother gently refusing to introduce images he saw in magazines into her rug weaving, images he now recognizes as corporate logos. Some of the paintings are dappled watercolors like those in Ma'ii and Cousin Horned Toad, others acrylics with thick, dynamic brushstrokes. Whatever the style, each reveals indimate knowledge of a people in harmony with the land.”

School Library Journal

“Navajo philosophy and an artist's personal experience infuse this collection of paintings and (mostly free) verse. Begay's subjects vary from the sublime (creation, prayer, death, healing) to the mundane (riding in a truck, splashing in the mud after rain). Coyote (Ma'ii) plays a recurrent and significant role here, but Begay's impulse is to note and celebrate, rather than explain, important aspects of his culture. There are lessons to be learned, both cultural and universal, but obliquely. He does not blame the contemporary Anglo world for anything, but it intrudes, in ways often uncomprehending or disharmonious, and must be reckoned with. He chooses, nevertheless, to end his book in a season of hope with a poem called ``Early Spring.'' The two central themes here, beauty and mystery, find natural expression in 20 acrylic paintings. Their stippled surfaces recall pointillist or Impressionist style, but the artist's palette rests on colors rooted to his people: the vermillion of desert earth and the blues of sky, flower, and turquoise. His figures are dignified but not idealized. Powerful and appealing in both word and image, this reflective book should find a wide audience of sympathetic readers.”

E.  CONNECTIONS

Students may enjoy the following books about Native American customs and traditions: 

Begay, Shonto. 1992. MAII AND COUSIN HORNED TOAD: A TRADITIONAL NAVAJO STORY. ISBN 9780590453905

Duncan, Lois. 2000. Ill. by Shonto Begay. THE MAGIC OF SPIDER WOMAN.  ISBN 9780590461466

Maher, Maher. 2004. Ill. by Shonto Begay. ALICE YAZZIE’S YEAR. ISBN 9781582460809

Casler, Leigh. 1994. Ill by Shonto Begay. THE BOY WHO DREAMED OF AN ACORN. ISBN 9780399225475