the poster to our blog and Ted talk

kind regards,
Carlijn and Esther

Assignment 12

(recorded in multiply voicethreads)

http://voicethread.com/share/10298044 1
http://voicethread.com/share/10298049 2
http://voicethread.com/share/10298057 3

Kind regards,
Carlijn and Esther

Assignment 14

1. Having worked through all the assignments on the webquest, do you think that what happened to the Native Americans could be considered an act of genocide? Why? Motivate your answer.

Yes this indeed could be considered as an act of genocide because many indians died on the reservations. there are a few features of genocide such as: killing members of the group, which they did.., causing harm either physical or mentally, they caused as well, forcibly transferring children to boarding schools and seperate kids from their families to kill the Indian to save the child.
other things were to prevent births within the group and there was a time that the pilgrims hunted them down and killed them and would get paid for every head.
so yes.. this could be considered as an act of genocide.

 

2. How can we prevent such acts of genocide from happening again?

We can prevent such acts from ever happening again by rules and laws in which is clear that killing or discriminating others based on culture or skin colour is wrong and could be punished hard. because it is bad what we have done and this should never happen again.

 

3. Can you explain the title of this webquest?

back to the future means that we have to look to the past, see what happened then and now have awareness of what we have done so that this will not happen again.

 

4. How can we create awareness of the situation of the Native Americans in the past and the present?

 
we think that museums are very important, so museums about native Americans should be opened more, also here in the Netherlands and maybe by making the entrance free people would come and visit, in here they can find out what has happened and how bad it all was.
or maybe we could use the media to create awareness, by a tv show or a weekly column in the papers in which they provide information and in which people can react, people from Indian families and non Indians.
 

5. How can we link this to the present IS situation?

The IS is now killing people just like the pilgrims did, to create a land for themselves regardless of the people living there.

kind regards,
Carlijn and Esther

What do we think
literature

Why do you think Native American novels often reflect on the past?

 

We think that Native Americans novels often reflect on the past since there is a lot to write about. all the stories from then are passed out to the children, grandchildren and grand grand children, for generations. now is the time to tell these stories since people now think more about their actions and might reflect on them self how bad they have been, because they really have been bad.

 

Kind regards,

Carlijn and Esther

Assignment 13

1. Who is Numanah?

Numanah is the grandfather of the Indian who wrote this poem.

 

2. What is the significance of the title?

the title refers to the circle, first he wants to run away from the reservation, after that he wants to run away back to the reservation and in the end he says that he, again, wants to run away, now away from the reservation. it is a circle of going and staying.

 

3. What does the opening line remind you of in regard to religion?

The Indians have a rich culture in which they obey their grandparents, the wise people.

In here he begs his grandfather to sent him grace, for a new start and to give him hope again.   

 

4. Look at the list of themes in assignment 12, once again, and decide which of these relate to the poem and why. Give examples from the poem to explain your answers.

hopes and dreams

in the beginning of his poem he prays to his grandfather to send him grace, a new start in which he will not have to live on a stained mattress and will have hope, since he can not find it in the reservation. when he runs away he finds out that there are worse things and runs back again. in the reservation he again remembers that there is so little hope and wants to run away again.

 

5. What "shame" does the poet refer to? 

 that when he runs away he want to run back again, he feels a little ashamed for that especially when he is back that he again wants to run away.

 

6. How does the idea of living in-between cultures relate to the themes mentioned in assignment 12 and use examples from the poem to explain your answer.

the boy feels as if he is trapped between two cultures and gets confused when he runs away from one and wants to go back again.

it relates to the themes since this is a feeling felt by many Indians. 

kind regards,

Carlijn and Esther

 

 

Assignment 11Here are some of the characteristics of the Native-American genre:

The use of "black humour"
The trickster
Treaties
The quest for cultural identity

Choose two of these characteristics, explain them and find examples in the book. Give quotes and page numbers.
Post everything in your blog.

The use of  ''black humour''
The Indians used black humour to make light of a matter that is generally considered taboo. For example:

Rowdy's father is drinking hard and throwing punches. That's why he and his mother Always are walking around with bloody and bruised faces. So Rowdy said it was war paint.
“It’s war paint,” Rowdy always says. “It just makes me look tougher.'' - Chapter 3.

He tries to loosen it up by saying that it is war paint, while it actually is a big problem that his alcoholic father beats him.

Treaties
After the treaties, the Indians had to live in reservations. This is an item that comes back in lots of books in the Native-American genre.
Every time Arnold went to school, he had to travel around 22 miles to get there and crossed the border of the reservation.

The next morning, Dad drove me the twenty-two miles to Reardan. ~ chapter 6

image from chapter 5, the two ways, hope outside of the reservation and his home in the reservations

Kind regards,
Carlijn and Esther

Assignment 10

 

 

Questions about the book "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian" by Sherman Alexie

 

 

1. Why did Mr. P say, "Son, you're going to find more hope the farther and farther you walk away from this sad, sad, sad reservation"?

 

Mr. P was his old teacher, after Arnold threw a book at him Mr. P looked for him to speak with him for a while.

He never blamed him for throwing that book, or well he wasn't very happy with it, it hurted.. but he could understand him. As a teacher he had seen for a long time that there wasn't very much hope in the reservations, they had to learn things from books even his mother had used.

Mr. P supported him in making the decision to go to Reardan, there he would get a good education and there would be more hope in 'the world of white people'.  

 

2. Give 2 examples of "black comedy" in the book. Give quotes and page numbers.
  

Do you know what happens to retards on the rez?
We get beat up.
At least once a month.
Yep, I belong to the Black-Eye-of-the-Month Club.
~ chapter one

And sure, sometimes, my family misses a meal, and sleep is the only thing we have for dinner, but I know that, sooner or later, my parents will come bursting through the door with a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken.
Original Recipe.
And hey, in a weird way, being hungry makes food taste better. There is nothing better than a chicken leg when you haven’t eaten for (approximately) eighteen-and-a-half hours. And believe me, a good piece of chicken can make anybody believe in the existence of God.
~ chapter two

3. Explain the significance of the use of drawings in the book.
The drawings in the book are there to make the book come alive, to make it funnier and just to illustrate all the bizarre situations Arnold is in.
Mostly he draws himself as a goofy person.

4. Explain how Arnold is caught between two worlds and how this is connected to the title of the book.

The two different worlds are the 'world of the reservation, a bit closed to the outside' and the 'white people world, in here the school of Reardan'. Arnold is a part time Indian because he originally is from the rez but goes to a school in Reardan.
So thats why they called the book the absolute true diary of a part time Indian.

5. There are several themes in the book. Choose 3 from the list (see assignment 12) and give detailed explanations and analysis for each.
Hopes and dreams - Arnold has no hope in the reservation, he sees al his neighbours, family members and other people in the rez who have a hard time to get jobs. Many of them have given up hope. Arnold sees a chance to get more hope, he transfers to Reardan, a school outside the reservation where all the white people go to school. In the eyes of the Indians, they are the ones who still got hope, since theyre not treated bad, are well educated, have money to spend and do not experience discrimation that much.

Education - He goes to school, a better school than in the rez to create chances. In his old school, they had books with his mothers name written in it. Since his mothers years of school, they still didn't change the books so you could say that the education in the reservations is subordinated. In the school of Reardan they do have better education and newer books so you could say that the education over there is perhaps better.

Poverty  - his family is poor, just like many other Indians. Arnold even has troubles hiding this since he doesn't want other people to find out that he is poor. He could get a free lunch, he is poor enough for it but Always spends his little money he has on the lunch. Or when he went to prom and afterwards went with a group to a diner, he ordered lots of things, not to seem poor but had to ask for money when he didn't feel well and had to vomit in the bathroom and Roger caught him.
Even his sister couldn't attend the funeral of her own granny because she had no money to travel.
Also the great gesture of his father who sneaked away on Christmas eve and came back after newyear, drunk and in a hangover but still gave Arnold 5 dollars, which he could have spent on a cheap whiskey but didn't!

6. How would you characterize the relationship between Rowdy and Junior at the end of the novel? Can the two ever really be best friends again? Are they part-time friends or real friends?
Arnold has one time said that he and Rowdy Always would be friends, even when they never saw each other or when Rowdy hated him. however a paragraph later Arnold wanted to emberass Rowdy during the match.
for their whole life Rowdy had protected Arnold, and he is very gratefull for that. but when he went to Reardan Rowdy got mad at him, for leaving him and betray him with his white hopes and dreams. however they still talked sometimes.. I think that they will still be part time friend.

7. While the Pow-wow sounds like fun, Arnold wants nothing to do with it. Why?
 Arnold doesn't want to do anything with it because he was afraid the Indians would get drunk and would beat him hard. He also didn't want Rowdy to fight for him because Rowdy Always had protected him and made Arnold even feel worse.

8. "Ever since the Spokane Indian Reservation was founded back in 1881, nobody in my family ever lived anywhere else. We Spirits stay in one place. We are absolutely tribal. For good or bad, we don't leave one another. And now my mother and father had lost two kids to the outside world."

Explain how Arnold's parents had lost two children to the outside world.They 'lost' Arnold when he went to Reardan highschool, he 'betrayed' the Indians and traded them for the white people, an outside world for most of the Indians.
While his sister, Mary, moved out to mary an Indian from another tribe. Also she went into the outside world, sometimes wrote cards but missed a lot, for example her grandmothers funeral.  

9. Mary describes her experience eating fry bread at a restaurant in an email to Arnold. Why is it significant that Mary can still get fry bread even though she's no longer on the Spokane Reservation?
The fried bread is originally a meal her grandmother used to make with the recepy from the Spokane tribe. That she could get fried bread in a hotel restaurant was strange to her, she imagined an old lady in the kitchen preparing the meal.

10. What does it mean to "kill the Indian to save the child"? [5.40]
 Mr. P confessed to Arnold that he used to beat the Indians during his lessons, he had to 'kill the Indian' by that he meant that they were trying to kill the Indian culture so that the kid would be saved (being Indian would be bad while getting rid of all the Indian culture would make the kid more white and thus save him, or create new chances).

kind regards
Esther and Carlijn

What do we think?
Boarding schools

Some people claim that there were positive aspects to the boarding school system. What do you think?

There are different ways to think of it, for the Indians it was terrible, they were youngsters when they were put in a boarding school and were taught being Indian was no good, they had to change and lose their inner Indian.
But... they were all schooled and were taught English and other subjects. For Indians on reservations jobs were hard to get, since the teachers never really cared. Now they were schooled in a good way and had a better chance to get in the job world. (still in a horrible way, being aparted from your family and tribe at such a young age must be terrible, many tried to escape but didn't succeed and were punished often for no reason!, being beaten, handcuffed to the beds when sleeping, living in constant hunger and being aparted from their family never having the chance to speak to them)

Kind regards,
Carlijn and Esther   

Assignment 9,

Poem, The runaways - Louise Eldrig

1. What is 'home' for the kids in these boarding schools?

Home for the kids, the runaways from the boarding school, is their old home, the place they used to live before being put in boarding schools. They long for the freedom and not being discriminated or treated poorly.

 

 

2. What was the impact of these boarding schools on the tribal traditions?

In these boarding schools the Native Americans were 'civilised', they were taught how to not be an Indian and how to be an American. These boarding schools brainwashed them so badly so that the Indian would go out of them.
The impact this had was that all the tribal traditions would be removed and that they were taught that being Indian was not good, they HAD to change and be like the 'better ones', the American. 

Kind Regards,
Carlijn and Esther