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Stereotypical Native American roles in media and literature
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In the chapter “Hope Against Hope”, Sherman Alexie uses Junior’s conversation with Mr. P to develop Junior’s reasons for leaving the rez to find a better life. Junior is talking to Mr. P after throwing a book at him and breaking his nose. When Mr. P tells Junior that when he was a young teacher, he and the other teachers had been trying to kill Indian culture, Junior gets really mad at him. The Mr. P says, “I can’t apologize to everyone I hurt, but I can apologize to you” (35). Junior then notes the oddity of the situation because the man whose nose he had broken was apologizing to him. This little detail shows that Junior feels out of his depth because he has never dealt with this kind of thing before. He has never seen anything like an adult apologizing to him after he hurt the adult. Later, when discussing the sudden failure of Mary Runs Away, Mr. P says that Junior deserves better, that he “is a good kid” (41) and he “deserve[s] the world” (41). This causes Junior to cry and realize that no teacher had said anything so nice to him. These details show that Junior starts to understand that the rez is not a good place for him to follow his dreams and he needs to find somewhere else to go. …show more content…
P tells Junior that he must leave the rez and that if he stays everyone is going to kill his hope and make him give up, Junior says he doesn’t want to fight anybody. Mr. P tells him that he has been fighting all of his life and kept his hope. Now Junior must “take [his] hope and go somewhere where other people have hope” (43). Junior asks where to find hope and Mr. P responds that he’ll find more and more hope the farther he walks away from the “sad, sad, sad reservation” (43). These details and repetition show that Junior now knows that in order to succeed, in order to have a fulfilling life, he must leave the rez with all of its sadness and hopelessness behind. This is the strongest motivator yet for him to
Junior was very irresponsible and was racing with his friends. This ended up very bad with the Cadillac’s parts all over the place. Lawrence senior got really upset and sent Junior to Stanford University to show him how to grow up and start being responsible with money and life.
One of these moments of loss of hope is when his grandma died by a drunk person on a motorcycle. His grandma has been his one savior in his life. When she died, Junior was really depressed and felt like giving up, but he still persisted because he remembers her final words “forgive him”. Junior’s sister, whom he loved dearly, also died in a house fire while she was passed out drunk. At this point, all hope was lost for Junior. However, he had courage and found a little bit of hope. That hope was Rearden. At Rearden, Junior learned many things. Junior found a new friend, Gordy who teaches him a lot about life, and was very wise. Junior also found love there too. Penelope was his love interest “almost girlfriend”, who really cared about him. Many people at Rearden were supportive of Junior and that inspired him to become the best person he could be. Junior’s coach was especially encouraging to Junior, he even went with Junior to the hospital and stayed up with him all night. An example of Rearden’s support was at two basketball games, one on the rez and one at Reardon. At the rez, all of Junior’s fellow tribe members were booing him, but at Reardon, all of his teammates cheered him up and told him he was going to do great. Junior realizes that he is the only one on his reservation that still has hope, his hope was hope for everyone on his
Jesse is ashamed that Little Jesse is nothing like him when he was a young boy, convincing himself that they cannot connect due to their difference in interests. Jesse tries to figure out how to celebrate Little Jesse’s achievements in his new school, so he asks his co-worker Mary Lou what she thinks would be a good activity. She is in disbelief
Junior was born in a desperate, hopeless place. His parents and community were withering in despair. However, Junior did not choose to languish like the rest of his community; he boldly left his comfort zone for a better education—facing obstacles from losing
This is not my first time meeting Junior; however, I would like to point out that before getting to know Junior, he was initially shy. It wasn’t until I had seen him four or five times that he made the connection that I was both the
With the obstacles that happen to Junior, it creates an emotional and traumatic impact on Junior as well as getting the readers hooked to turn the page and keep reading. To begin, in “The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian” Sherman Alexie describes a moment in Junior's life before he went to the white school. From comparing the death rates and even mentioning the deaths, Alexie shows an emotional impact on Junior from the deaths he has to go through. Alexie writes about how Junior being an Indian has impacted his life.
Even though I didn’t watch this tv show with this assignment in mind after watching for a short time it became evident that Junior didn’t live up to hegemonic male stereotypes. Bernie didn’t approve of junior’s hobbies and how he chooses to use his free time. And it’s pretty obvious it’s because he thinks that these types of activities make him “soft” like
While there is optimism in Jackson’s life we also find loneliness. The author shows the desolation that Jackson feels in the following line: “Piece by piece I disappeared” (p.170). The author portrays a slow dissolution of self. While there are people in his life there is a detachment as well. Throughout the story we realize that Jackson seems to buy his friends, through Rose and Junior with alcohol to the Aleuts with breakfast. Jackson’s “teammates, defender’s and posse” disappear and this further isolates Jackson. While Jackson lives a solitary life this does not stop him from buying friends where he
His first interaction with someone was this girl name Penelope their friendship started out awkward but ended up being great. Penelope is the prettiest girl in the school. Junior push hard to become friends with Penelope and even though he is not as cool as she is they still become friends. Junior would get bullied by these jogs who would always make fun of him and especially roger he was senior and one day junior showed him who he truly was and ended up getting the respect he deserve. Then came Gordy the genius of Reardan was the first person that became junior friend he is like rowdy but in his own unique way. Gordy is a geek and whenever junior ask for advice Gordy always searches his answer. Junior says Gordy and rowdy are almost alike but in their own way. Junior knew that Gordy wasn’t going to be his best friend because he even say it “And so we did become friends. Not the best of friends. Not like Rowdy and me. We didn’t share secrets. Or dreams” (Chapter 12). His first friend after he lost the one he cared so much
After Junior’s sister Mary dies in a terrible fire, he feels sad and alone. At school, his fellow students and friends make him feel better by giving him hugs and small slaps on the back. “They were worried about me. They wanted to help me with my pain. I was important to them.
During the interview with Sherman Alexie, he states, “I had no idea that my small life could appeal to anybody.. And it was because of all the Native writers that came before me that made me realize that my story might be important”. As you can see, the Native American life can seem so insignificant and make so many feels as if they have no impact on the world. Born into an undersized Indian Reservation, Sherman Alexie felt as if he couldn't go after his dream of becoming a pediatrician, as he states in the KCTS9 interview. He knew that he had to leave the reservation and go to the white school so that he could go after his desires in life. Alexie was going to be making a big choice and understood he would be “playing against his own siblings
Just as Johnny’s courage shines through so does his fast maturity from child to adult. His childhood was stolen away from him by his illness but instead of sulking he pulls himself together. He takes every difficulty in stride, and gets through them. Even when he is feeling down he hides it for he does not want anyone else to feel his pain. Being a seventeen year old boy he wants to do the things all other seventeen year old boys do.
Sherman Alexie was born on October 7th 1966. He is a novelist that lives in Seattle, Washington. Alexie is not only known for his novels, he is also known for being a story writer, a poet, and also a filmmaker. Sherman’s childhood was not the greatest. When Alexie was born, he was not expected to live. As a child, he had many problems with seizures, and an enlarged skull. He lived on a reservation, and was bullied by a lot of other children. Alexie’s mother wanted him to learn English, so she moved him to other schools. Alexie’s father was not around much when he was a child. He was an alcoholic and left the family from days on end. Sherman Alexie influenced Indian/Native American culture through his literary works including Face, One Stick Song, and First Indian on the Moon.
He goes through the struggles of deciding who he wants to be and who he is. He lived on a reservation with his family and attended the school there. He decided one day the only way he would go anywhere in life was if he were to attend Reardan, an all-white school. Here, Junior was forced to find who he really was. Junior experienced more struggles and tragedies than any white student at this school. He had to fight through the isolation he first experienced to building up the courage to play in a basketball championship. I believe that every event Junior wrote about throughout the novel had an important purpose, and even more importantly, could be related to sociology. As I read the novel, I constantly thought about questions such as the following: What importance does he have to write about this? Could I relate this to my life? Who is Alexie’s audience? Could anyone read this novel and learn something from it? By the time I completed the novel, I could answer all of these questions without a
Junior showed that his life wasn’t always a piece of cake, but he still wanted to make the best out of what he had. Even though he had to endure things like poverty, and bullying he still showed great strength through it all. People should learn from Junior because he can be a source of great encouragement. His strength didn’t come from winning. His struggles just developed his strengths. And at the end of the day he never surrendered to his struggles and that is what gave him such strength. So, live your life full of strength. Never ever surrender to your struggles because there is always at least a little bit of good and hope.