JC> SB> "I must admit that, instead, I was shocked and surprised at the sight
  > SB> that met my eyes.
JC> A very telling statement... All _visual_. It says nothing about 
"lifeways",
  > "worldview", etc.
A valid criticism.
JC> I would expect much the same reaction from someone that was removed from
  > East India, sent to the U.S. (or England) for several years to school
  > and returned home. The young lady is returning to a poverty-stricken 
rea.
  > If an East Indian came to the U.S. to medical school, should not they be
  > appalled at the poverty conditions of their homeland?
Her being initially appalled at the situation was not my concern.  It
was the refusal throughout the entire book to see anything at all good
about the Indian way of life she was returning to.  *Every* statement
made about the Indians were negative; including, for example, *all* the
native foods that were eaten.  During the book, she finally persuaded
her family to give up corn tortillas in favor of the much more
acceptable biscuit.
JC> SB> But the book continues in this vein: condemning the tribal
  > SB> governmental system as being brutal and dictatorial, expressing the
  > SB> hope that these "circumstances gives those interested in Indian
  > SB> education the hope that a brighter day may now be dawning, when the
  > SB> home conditions will be so changed that there will be no more tribal
  > SB> tyranny, but all will be under the protection and enjoy the 
priviledges
  > SB> of our good government."
JC> Do we know for a fact that the tribal government _wasn't_ "being brutal 
and
  > dictatorial"? Had the tribal government in this case already been 
"corrupte
  > by the white man?
No, we don't.  Or at leastI don't.  I did not research the book, beyond
reading it, well enough to be certain.
JC> SB> It condemns the Hopi dances as being evil.
JC> I knew some Baptists that will tell you ALL dancing is evil.
Grin!  None of the Baptists I know feel that way, however.
JC> SB> And, in the end, our heroine persuades her family to leave the 
pueblos,
  > SB> and build a small, white style house, elsewhere; so they could live 
n
  > SB> a more healthy and more cultured way.
JC> Was that "more healthy and more cultured way" bad? Should she have let 
them
  > continue to live in what she perceived to be unclean and impoverished?
I think she should have found at least some good in her traditional way
of life.  Even if much imrpovement was needed, the total condemnation of
a total culture shows a real inability to look at the complete picture.
JC> I can think of at least two other books/authors that look upon the 
Indian
  > school" period (or education or civilization) as a positive thing in 
heir
  > lives.
JC> "They Called It Prarie Light" by Tsianina Lomawaima and one of the books 
by
  > Luther Standing Bear. It also seems to me that Jim Thorpe attended 
Carlisle
  > _voluntarily_ because of the sports programs.
I will look them up.
JC> Ever read "Century of Dishonor" by Helen Hunt Jackson? Originally 
published
  > in 1881.
No.
JC> I think that it is interesting that in 1881, the "American public" faced 
mu
  > the same dilemma as today. What _is_ the solution?
I am struggling to find some sort of solution.  And, to be perfectly
honest, I don't have it, not even for all of my own people, let alone
other peoples. I know, however, that an abandonment of culture is *not*
the answer. Those who have tried have often ended up dead of an
overdose.  I also know that denial of modern technology, which has come
from many sources, is also not the answer.
JC> There was a BIG article in the newspaper the other day about the Lakota 
n
  > the Dakotas. O.K., now after reading the article, I know all about the
  > high unemployment, the poverty, the corruption in the tribal government, 
th
  > fact that their casino doesn't bring in as much wealth as the tribe would
  > like and casino expansion construction is halted due to some contractual
  > dispute, and some program to start a cattle industry failed because beef
  > prices have fallen, etc. I now know ALL of that. I also know that many of
  > the same phenomena are present ALL over the U.S. and the rest of the 
world.
  > The BIG question, however, is:
JC> "What's the _practical_ solution?"
Again, I don't know.  But I think the answer will have to come from the
Lakotas themselves.  They will have to figure out how to create a
winning situation for their own people.
JC> Oh, in the book "Neither Wolf Nor Dog", the "elder teaching the white 
an"
  > has an interesting philosophy on what most "mainstream culture" people
  > would call "trash" or "litter" or "junk".
I will need to read it before commenting on it.
                Sondra
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 þ SLMR 2.1a þ We are all works in progress.   H. Jackson Brown
--- Opus-CBCS 1.7x via O_QWKer 1.7 
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