Smoke Signals Essay

The Underdog Growing up as a Native American boy on a reservation, Sherman Alexie was not expected to succeed outside of his reservation home. The expectations for Native American children were not very high, but Alexie burst out of the stereotype and expectations put by white men. Young Native Americans were not expected to overcome their stereotypes and were forced to succumb to low levels of reading and writing “he was expected to fail in a non-Indian world” (Alexie 3), but Alexie was born with

The next idea that Sherman Alexie answers is what is like to be an Indian Man in the short story “An Indian Education” it seems as if to be an Indian man is to be caught between two worlds and sometimes picking one over the other. For example, the passage on page 176 states the following: “But on the day I leaned through the basement window of the HUD house and kissed the white girl, I felt the good-byes I was saying to my entire tribe” (176). For the narrator of that section he felt like had to

In “The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me” Sherman Alexie explains life struggling a lot as a Spokane Indian boy. Alexie was always expected to fail and remain “dumb” because he lived in an Indian reservation. He talks about how reading has impacted and influenced his life and how he wants to help others to experience what he did. Sherman Alexie shows to us through his essay that one does not need to be to fluent in reading and writing in order learn. Sherman Alexie shows us this by using

When reading multiple stories from different authors it gives the reader a variety of opportunities to connect with the author’s. It helps the reader better understand what they are reading. I personally connected with two different authors’. My personal upbringing had a tremendous impact on mine, Joe Wilkins, and Sherman Alexie life. It has molded me into the person I am today, but has not limited me in the possibilities for the future. My parents were uneducated and never attend college. My father

In the novel Indian Horse by Richard Wagamese, Saul Indian Horse spent his childhood being abused in a residential school. Saul’s own family either died or abandoned him while he was young so Saul was left with a void to fill. The theme of family is explored in Indian Horse through Saul’s desire to find true family. At the residential school, St. Jerome’s, Saul makes a connection with one of the priests, Father Gaston Leboutilier. Later on in his life Saul bonds with Ervin Sift. Finally, Saul finds

Rhetorical Analysis of Sherman Alexie’s “Superman and Me” “Superman and Me” is a personal essay Alexie wrote to talk about his experience of learning to read at a very young age despite living in a poor family and having limited resources available to him. The main topic of the essay discusses the importance of books and defeating the stereotypes put on Native Americans. He was born on an Indian reservation with his three siblings and very little money but, he was lucky in the aspect of having a

Challenges Faced and Lessons Learnt Junior Spirit, from the book “The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian” by Sherman Alexie, and Randy Pausch from the book “The Last Lecture” by Randy Pausch both face many challenges. In “The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian”, Junior Spirit faces many challenges, that include poverty, being bullied and not fitting in, and losing people who were important to him. In “The Last Lecture”, Randy Pausch faces challenges such as trying to write a last

“We lived on a combination of irregular paychecks, hope, fear, and government surplus food” (Alexie paragraph 1). A young Native American boy, living on a Spokane Indian Reservation, is not expected to achieve anything in life. While growing up, he learned to read with Superman comic books, and later grew up to become an aspiring poet, writer, and a creative writing teacher. Sherman Alexie, the young, hopeful Indian boy, often uses his knowledge to teach underprivileged Native American children

In novel The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian we see that hope and poverty affects Junior’s life. In the novel, we see the consequences that people face on the reservation with lack of hope and the share of poverty. In the novel we see that some people like Junior’s mother never gives up on hope. She believes that with hope her son can do anything. With this being said Junior knows that “My parents came from poor people who came from poor people who came from poor people” (14). This is

Sherman Alexie was a Indian boy with a passion to learn how to read. Despite the fact that Indians were known to not be educated, he was one of the few that learned. He started learning to read at a very young age. He would read his dad’s books and everything else he could get his hands on. The first book he read was a Superman comic book. That comic book left a big impact on the rest of Alexie’s life. “I refused to fail. I was smart. I was arrogant. I was lucky,” Alexie says in his story. Alexie