Louis L’Amour - Not as Progressive as He May Seem
Louis L’Amour’s The Gift of Cochise is a piece of frontier literature that has a strong female lead, Angie Lowe, and praises the Apache as proud warriors and people. Written in the 1900’s this piece is set in a time where women and men are not seen as equals and the Native Americans are treated as second class citizens (as they arguably are today). Do to the nature of the story, on the surface, Louis L’Amour seems like an incredibly progressive writer in who pushes against the boundaries of his time. However, despite having a female lead and depicting the Apache in a good light, Louis L’Amour is not incredibly progressive as a writer. In The Gift of Cochise, L’Amour cleverly hides within his writing justifications for westward expansion and the removal of the Apache. Throughout the short story, the Author portrays the Apache as proud warriors but hidden within this praise L’Amour actually belittles the group of Native Americans. Examples of said backhanded compliments are when Cochise decides to no longer attack Angie because “(t)he Apache was a fighting man, and he respected fighting blood” and when Ches Lane tries to gain his freedom through a duel because he hoped “mercy might lead to mercy, that the Apache’s respect for a fighting man would win his freedom” [L’Amour 56,65]. While this may seem to be a praise of a high warrior code that the Apache follow strictly, in reality this demeans them by calling their way of life
Chapter One, Surrounded by Enemies: The Apache way of life and Geronimo as a young
Clarisse was forgotten, she wasn’t remembered. She was gone. Simply gone. Due to the rumor Mildred spread around town, many believed Clarisse had unfortunately died in a car accident. Others created their own fictional story of Clarisse’s mysterious disappearance. Those who ignored her had no idea that she was gone, or that she even existed in the first place. However, few knew the real story behind Clarisse and what really happened after her so called “car accident”.
The Lakota Indians, are sometimes known as the Sioux, but they call themselves the Lakota, which is translated as ‘friend’ or ‘ally’ in their native tongue. Their description of themselves make sense when looking at their seven virtues that they live by, “These are Wóčhekiye (Prayer), Wóohola (Respect), Wówauŋšila (Compassion), Wówičakȟe (Honesty), Wówačhaŋtognaka (Generosity), Wówaȟwala (Humility) and Wóksape (Wisdom) (“Lakota Today”). A culture’s idea of the most importance qualities a good person should have gives a good idea of what kind of people they are. The Lakota’s virtues all revolve around a general concept of respect for everything, compassion, humility, and honesty. These things can either refer to their fellow man, or
Perusing once more from nineteenth century working class sexual orientation parts, which consigned ladies solidly to the private universe of the home, students of history saw the white frontier lady's cooperation in a preindustrial family unit economy as empowering. A comparative propensity to romanticize the hard existence of Native American ladies differentiated their opportunity and impact with the patriarchal structure within which European ladies lived. Despite the fact that comparisons are perhaps unavoidable, they can cloud the complexities of ladies' lives both the assorted qualities that described them and the purposes of shared belief they shared. Such examinations likewise divert consideration from the historical changes that shaped these ladies' lives: the triumph of Native American, the importation and oppression of Africans, the monstrous relocation of European, and the financial and political developing of the British settlements. This period secured by the following section, the progressive time of 1750-1800, was likewise thick with changes that capably influenced the lives of
When Europeans encountered the Native Americans, the encounter was fraught with difficulties for both sides, for the Native Americans more so than the Europeans. Europeans conquered the Native Americans, forced them into labor, and spread diseases which the Native Americans had no resistance to. In addition to this the Europeans considered themselves superior to the Native Americans. Despite this, the Europeans and Native Americans, both had things the other wanted and so they often engaged in trade with each other. However, the Native Americans thought that, despite not having the luxuries the Europeans had, they were better off than the Europeans. This sentiment is exemplified in “Your People Live Only Upon Cod” by French priest Chrestian LeClerq who was traveling with the Micmac Indians. It is a documented response by an unknown Micmac leader to European, particularly French, claims of superiority. In analyzing this document, we will find that the cultures of the French and the Micmac were vastly different. We will also discover what the Micmac and the French thought of each other.
The attacks on Indians by the whites could now be excused because the Indians had murdered family members. They could kill, scalp, and rob Indians without much fear of being caught or punished. A play based on real life, written by Indian fighter, Robert Rogers, showed how two hunters happened upon two Indians. As they talked, both told of how Indians had murdered some family members, so it was logical to them to kill the Indians, scalp them and robbed them of the guns, hatchets and furs. The “victims’ furs were a fantastic windfall”. (129)
“Indians are like the weather.” With his opening words Vine Deloria Jr. sets up the basis for the rest of his witty yet substantial manifesto, Custer Died for Your Sins. The book, which describes the struggles and misrepresentation of the American Indian people in 1960s American culture, is written in a style that changes from ironic and humorous satire to serious notions, then back again. Through energetic dialogue that engages the reader in a clever and articulate presentation, Deloria advocates the dismissal of old stereotypes and shows a viewpoint that allows the general public to gain a deeper understanding of what it is to be an American Indian.
Black Robe is a film that greatly exemplifies the views the Natives and the French held of one another during the 1600s. Both groups help impressions of each other that influenced how they interacted together. During the Native and French encounters in Black Robe, it was apparent that Natives viewed the French as incompetent, weak, but also interesting; the French had their own impressions that the Natives were savages and in need of salvation. It is with the Algonquins that one can see the interest they held in their view of the French. In Black Robe, there is a scene with the Natives sitting in a church-like building watching a clock.
“Mixed cultural signals have perpetuated certain stereotypes…”(Page 372, paragraph 2, line 1). The Myth of the Latian Woman: I Just Met a Girl Named Maria, by Judith Ortiz Cofer is about how Judith Ortiz Cofer was discriminated because she is a Latina Woman. She describes about several people treating her differently than others, through song, through looks, and through sexual thoughts and actions towards her. Even after all the discriminating actions persisted upon her, she still pursues on to help others learn that Latinas are not always like the movies say they are or should be like. Judith Ortiz Cofer does this by writing poetry and novels. “My personal goal in my public life is try to replace the old pervasive stereotypes and myths about
Both Ernest Hemingway’s Hills Like White Elephants and John Steinbeck’s The Chrysanthemums portray oppressed female characters in the early 1900s. In Hemingway’s short, Jig is oppressed by her lover known only as “The American,” whereas, the main character in The Chrysanthemums, Elisa Allen, feels the weight of oppression from society (male dominated) as a whole. Although the driving force of the two women’s subjugation varies slightly, their emotional responses to such are what differentiate the two.
The 19th century novel Cranford was, in many ways, a progressive story for its era. At a time when women are still unable to vote, Cranford exists as a community dominated by independent, female characters. Elizabeth Gaskell begins by likening the women to “Amazons,” a mythological race of powerful female warriors (Gaskell 5). However, while the presence of women may be strong in the town, Cranford is not quite a feminist tale. Just as the ladies support one another, they are also engaged in constant competition with their neighbors, and though men are largely absent from the community, some women in the story still rely upon men and desire husbands or admit themselves as inferior in other ways.
In the short story “Indian Camp”, by Ernest Hemingway, many controversies arise about the idea of feminism in the text. Feminism is a general term used to describe advocating women’s rights socially, politically, and making equal rights to those of men. Feminist criticism is looked through a “lens” along the line of gender roles in literature, the value of female characters within the text, and interpreting the perspective from which the text is written. Many of Hemingway’s female characters display anti-feminist attributes due to the role that women play or how they are referred to within a text by him or other characters. There are many assumptions that go along with the
This proliferation of anti-Indian imagery seems to have quickly ingrained itself in the colonial psyche, leading eventually to the prevalence of strong anti-Indian sentiment called the “anti-Indian sublime.” The anti-Indian sublime took hold during the Seven Years’ War. Literary anti-Indianism was an electrifying set of images, purpose-built for the interpretation of suffering in terms of injury by Indians. Many colonists came to hate natives because some among them spread tales of horrors committed on Euro-Americans by their indigenous neighbors. To a surprising degree, Pennsylvanians experienced Indian war as being about the communication of strong emotions – always starting with fear and ending for some with a wish to be backed by the
The Portrayal of the Plight of Women by the Author, In Their Particular Period of Time
The utilization of traditional and non-traditional gender roles in the novel “Song of Solomon” written by Toni Morrison shows the influences, expectations and impact that the gender roles have and place not only on the individual characters but on men and women in general and within the different communities.