...American Indians have been portrayed in the media a countless number of times throughout history. This often includes advertisements of technology. Frequently automotive ads portray “Indian-ness.” This isn’t the only industry that uses stereotypes of Native Americans to try and enhance the product they are selling. These stereotypes depict freedom, appearance, use of headdresses by almost all Native American people, and lack of education. Freedom A majority of people associate Native Americans with freedom. Many tribes are nomadic and Native people were the last in the United States to fall under the governing style that the rest of the United States followed. Cars and motorcycles have always had an association with freedom. This is why...
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...Immigrants and Native Americans in the United States have always experienced stereotypes from people outside of their culture due to ignorance and lack of empathy. Sherman Alexie and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie use personal narrative to depict how one can easily stereotype and fit a person into a certain category. Ultimately, broadening one's view and understanding that humans innately have the same basic wants and need can eliminate stereotypes. To start, Sherman Alexie depicts the rough and depression lifestyle Native Americans have to endure living on a reservation. Using a first person perspective Alexie starts by writing how the system on a reservation is broken. He depicts this by writing “ When I spelled all the words right, she crumpled...
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...recent years has arisen around the use and abuse of Native American team mascots. The Cleveland Indians, Atlanta Braves, Washington Redskins, Kansas City Chiefs, Florida State Seminoles, and so forth -- these are just a few of the images and names popularly associated with Native Americans that are still used as mascots by professional sports teams, dozens of universities, and countless high schools. This practice, a troubling legacy of Native -- Euro-American relations in the United States, has sparked heated debates and intense protests that continue to escalate. These caricatures and stereotypes are really intended as prisons of image. Inside each desperately grinning Indian or each stoic redskin brave or Chief Illiniwek,...
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...In his short autobiographical essay “Superman and Me,” Sherman Alexie uses powerful sentences, visualization, and repetition to create a well-written vivid story. Alexie addresses his own childhood experiences with education. He was a young boy that lived in poverty on an Indian reservation where Indians were derided for being educated. He states that “Indian children were expected to fail in the non-Indian world” (Alexie 584). His parents would be considered poor in most western standards, but to reservation standards they were a middle-class family. Even with the odds of expectation and poverty against him, Alexie describes how he escaped these circumstances by teaching himself how to read. This ambition for success derived from his father who had a passion for reading. Because of his love and dedication to his father, he decided to have the same passion. Before he could read words he was able to review his father’s books and distinguish what a paragraph was. This initiated his path to success by comparing everything in his life to a paragraph “a paragraph was a fence that...
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...viewers in every aspect of their lives. In Hollywood movies, Americans and Indians are the key players as a result of their long interaction in the history of America. Therefore, Hollywood movies greatly affect the perceptions of the Americans and other audiences about Indians. In most cases, Hollywood stereotype Indians as savages, as well as primitives. They portray Indians as vicious and dangerous people headed for extinction. Even with the production of Indians and western films, this wrong perception of Indians still remains in the mind of many movie audiences (Aleiss, 35). The Native American has experienced extensive damage from mass media in the way it portrays cowboys and their process of moving in the west. These cowboys moved across the west conquering the lands while riding the horses. In real sense, they were driving the Indians out (Mihelich, 130). This example points out at some of the cultural misconceptions created by the Hollywood. The conception of the movie by young Americans is inaccurate, as well as highly damaging. This misconception especially in young children makes it difficult for them to learn about the Native Americans of the present days (O'Connor, 72). The stereotype on Indians has also affected the Indians in America. Many of them suffer from self-esteem deficiency caused by the stereotyped depicted by the Hollywood. Over the decades, the culture and the religion of the native Indians has been suppressed violently. Therefore, many people...
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...Argument Analysis “Perhaps the most intangible aspect of Native peoples’ existence is compromised within [tribal] stories” (Tsosie 302). In society today we are seeing the growth of other cultures being incorporated into the fashions trends, movies, and in commercial use. The term, “cultural appropriation”, comes into use when discussing the problems Native Americans face in society today. It is defined as “the taking- from a culture that is not one’s own-of intellectual property, cultural expressions or artifacts, history and the ways of knowledge” (Tsosie 310). Cultural appropriation today under the liberal tradition follow these suppositions “if non-Indians want to dress up like Indians and imitate Indian religion, then they should have the freedom to do so” (Tsosie 310). The fight for the right of ownership of cultural rights and property is not only intellectual but political as well. For many years, ethnic groups, especially Native Americans, have been in the fight to have returned what was originally them. They also argue that the portrayal of their culture in movies promote stereotypes about them within society (Tsosie 301). People misuse their clothing, symbols, and religious practices. Other arguments also exist like that “cultural appropriation harms the appropriated community because it interferes with the community’s ability to define itself and established its own identity” (Tsosie 313). In the United States, Native people are protected by “special rights” (Tsosie 301)...
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...“Leslie Marmon Silko.” Poetryfoundation.org. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/lesliemarmon-silko. 21, Sep. 2017. Leslie Marmon Silko was born in 1948 in New Mexico to a well-known photographer Lee Marmon and his wife Mary Virginia Leslie. She is mixed with Mexican and Anglo-American background. Leslie grew up on a reservation called Laguna Pueblo. She attended a school on her reservation until fifth grade, she then relocated to a Catholic school in Albuquerque. She was not allowed to speak her language but it never stopped her from becoming successive. She then went and got her Bachelor’s degree at University of New Mexico in 1969. The same year she printed her first story “The Man to Send Rain Clouds.” She attended law school for a short time but left to continue her writing in 1971. She won an award called the National Endowment for the Arts Discovery Grant in 1971. Leslie accomplished many things throughout her career. She was awarded a-lot throughout her years of writing including for the Pushcart Prize for poetry and the MacArthur “Genius” Award....
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...Expressive Essay (Observation, Ethnography or Memoir) First Draft ENC 1101 – CR Junkins Purpose: What do I want the student to do? In this course, we will explore the two most commonly used forms of writing for college students: expressive writing and academic writing. Expressive writing captures what is important to the writer. In order to succeed, writers must understand themselves. Such writing is deeply personal. Expressive writing is designed to prepare students for writing outside academics—communicating feelings and observations, beliefs and opinions, community and individuality—all skill sets that will enable students to succeed in any discipline or career path. From a learning perspective, expressive writing is often an easier form of writing than academic. It allows students to begin working with such concepts as language, reasoning and mechanics while working with material they find worth discussing. In this assignment, I want students to carefully examine both themselves and their community. What makes their community unique? What is their place within the community? How did their unique, individual personality take shape? Project Overview: How do I want the student to do the assignment? Component One: Personal Students will choose to write on one of the following three topics: • One’s sense of place (observation) • One’s place within a community (ethnography) • One’s relationship to an event from the past (memoir) ...
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...Native American Culture, Text and Curriculum ! 1 Native American Culture, Text and Curriculum Scott T. Timmerman Wisconsin Lutheran College Native American Culture, Text and Curriculum ! 2 Abstract In Wisconsin there is nothing so familiar yet so invisible as the presence of the Indian culture. We find ourselves surrounded by the history of the Native Americans no matter where we go. There are 11 Indian reservations, numerous cities and counties named after Indians and historical images and museums throughout the state. Nonetheless, the vast majority of people from Wisconsin know little about the past or the current culture of the original Americans. There are currently hundreds of different cultures today for Native Americans, yet the still existing Native cultures are lumped under one mistaken title, Indian. Most non-Natives have either never knowingly met a Native person or are unaware of the presence of modern Native communities. They do not know Native American history and they assume Native Americans are only to be found in history. Most children today do not realize that Native Americans are still part of our state today. We need to take a close and honest look at the ways in which Native stories, Native life, and Native people are presented to our children in the classrooms. We need to examine and understand how important children’s literature can be. It can reinforce the worst in us and in our children or it can encourage true intellectual growth. Most...
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...She used real life examples throughout her argument, which is conducive to a thought out essay. The first step to a proposal argument is defining a problem or need, which is what Riley did. 3) The guidelines for portraying people with disabilities is, in my opinion, particular. The guideline aims to define the vocabulary of what people with disabilities prefer to be associated with. Personally, I find the guidelines necessary because many people are misinformed or don’t know how to identify disabled people properly, so this can prove useful. 4) In the case of Colin, and his depiction in the movie “The Secret Garden”, Riley’s stereotypes prove to be true. In the film, Colin, a bedridden boy, is depicted as “pitiable and pathetic; sweet and innocent; a miracle cure”. The expected outcome of a character who is disabled. Now, this can create issues within the disabilities community because of the portrayal of a disabled person. Thus, bringing back to light Riley’s “Guideline for Portraying people with Disabilities in the Media”. Link:...
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...Summary and Personal Responses to Tanya Maria Barrientos’s “Se Habla Espanol” English 115 July 13, 2014 In her essay “Se Habla Espanol” Tanya Maria Barrientos expresses her struggle of being a pure Latina who doesn’t speak Spanish. Being born in Guatemala, a Spanish speaking country, she and her family moved to the United States of America at three years old. (Barrientos, 2011) now living in Texas her parents made the decision that their children would cease speaking Spanish only to speak, read, and write English molding them into America’s Anglo culture. Barrientos set out to defy the stereotypes being placed on brown people while at the same time believing them herself. She stated “To me, speaking Spanish translated into being poor. It meant waiting tables and cleaning hotel rooms.” (Barrientos) Not being seen as Mexican was a compliment in her eyes while not speaking Spanish equated to being white. Clearly she was not proud of her heritage and at the age of 16 in attempt to reverse the disdain for her culture Barrientos was sent to Mexico for the summer by her father. To her surprise pride emerged but created a new dilemma. How can you be a proud Latina and not speak Spanish? She set out to learn it. After taking several Spanish classes she continued to feel laughable around native Spanish speakers. Not only did she struggle with the language but with the fact that she was now frowned upon as a Spanish woman who can’t speak the language. Barrientos eventually...
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...to building a superb educational community with students of diverse talents, experiences, opinions, and backgrounds. What would you as an individual bring to our medical school community? Being Asian in the racially homogenous community of [small town], it was clear: I did not belong. When my father moved to South Korea after my 8th grade year, I was excited to spend summers there. I would finally belong. I was wrong. My excellent Korean language skills let me feign native status but my American mannerisms betrayed me. To Koreans, I was just American. At [university], a diverse community, I sought out Korean-Americans. But they questioned whether I truly understood the Asian-American experience due to my [predominantly white state] upbringing. To them, I was white. While these cultural rejections from my various communities were painful, I learned to recognize individuals as unique entities despite shared identity markers such as race. I vowed to always see the whole person; not just her external stereotypes. I have stayed true to this promise as a teacher in [New York City] and have seen the rewards in the form of fruitful relationships. I will continue to do the same with my patients. My struggles to belong taught me to work easily with a variety of people by adjusting my perspectives without sacrificing my values, and listening carefully to others. I built my own sense of belonging, which was more than my race. The extensive time I have spent in an array of communities...
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...Piper, Carolee Schneemann, and Eva Hesse who participated in and prompted the artistic directions. The purpose of the feminist movement was to protest for equal rights, sexism, gender roles, and reproductive rights so women could be allowed in the American art world. In 1971, art historian Linda Nochlin published an essay “Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?” In this article she argued with art critics and historians. Nochlin explained how women were being excluded from all art exhibits and collections. Women started protesting by picketing museums and staging demonstrations. In 1972, women started shaping American society by opening their own art galleries all over the world to show their work. They opened feminist art programs at Fresno State College and California Institute of the Arts (Cal Arts) in early 1970. By 1974 over 1,000 United States colleges and universities offered women’s studies courses. In 1975, women started creating images of their bodies to proclaim women’s right to control and enjoy their bodies, which was the start of women’s liberation, while other women decided to dress up their painting with embroidery, knitting, quilting, and china paintings to raise consciousness and redirect modern American art. In 1940’s, women started using initials or changing their names to reflect male gender names to overcome the invisibility and inferiority of women’s history and art. Many female artist started challenging male artists for dominance in the art...
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... Professor Ober First Year Writing 29 September 2014 The Contact Zone The Holocaust happened because two groups of people were grappling with each and one was stronger than the other. Wars typically occur because two cultures disagree and choose to settle it, and the strong culture prevails. African American and Caucasian people used to be exiled for getting married, because they were different. There are millions of different cultures in the world today and every day is an example of how they clash. An author, Mary Louise Pratt, wrote an essay referring to these conflicts. Her essay made it possible to further examine these struggles. In works such as The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao and “Family Stories From the Trail of Tears” Pratt’s essay makes it possible to deeply examine the clashing culture and gain insight into how it impacted the world today. Mary Louise Pratt’s essay is called “Arts of the Contact Zone”. She defines a contact zone as a space where two cultures wrestle with each other’s ideas and beliefs. She goes on to discuss how these contact zones have come to help shape society, and how the aftermath is world changing. Her essay provides an excellent analysis of what happens when two distinct cultures come into contact, and most importantly, how that affects others. She also examines the two phenomena that occur as a result of the Contact Zone. One sensation, authoethnography, gives the reader first hand insight into cultures. The other, transculturation...
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...Essay on Native American Environmental Issues by David R. Lewis This essay is taken from Native America in the Twentieth Century: An Encyclopedia, edited by Mary B. Davis and published in 1994 by Garland Publishers of New York. The encyclopedia includes additional essays on mining, natural resource management, hunting and fishing rights, and economic development. It's a highly recommended resource. Reprinted without permission for educational purposes. Traditionally Native Americans have had an immediate and reciprocal relationship with their natural environments. At contact, they lived in relatively small groups close to the earth. They defined themselves by the land and sacred places, and recognized a unity in their physical and spiritual universe. Their cosmologies connected them with all animate and inanimate beings. Indians moved in a sentient world, managing its bounty and diversity carefully lest they upset the spirit "bosses," who balanced and endowed that world. They acknowledged the power of Mother Earth and the mutual obligation between hunter and hunted as coequals. Indians celebrated the earth's annual rebirth and offered thanks for her first fruits. They ritually addressed and prepared the animals they killed, the agricultural fields they tended, and the vegetal and mineral materials they processed. They used song and ritual speech to modify their world, while physically transforming that landscape with fire and water, brawn and brain. They did not passively...
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