Chippewa Tracks Summary

Superior Essays
INTRODUCTION

Culture is an umbrella term that covers almost every aspects of life. It includes different concepts when viewed from various perspectives. It can be described in individual level as well as communal level, though they are mutually dependent. An individual defines the culture at the level of the community he or she follows the patterns of the society in which he or she lives. The culture of a community is defined by the living patterns of the members of the society. Culture has an important place in one’s identity. Identity is a process of becoming, constructing from the matrix of similarities and difference. Culture is a source of reviving the cultural identity. The culture enables us to locate our identity in a cultural space.
…show more content…
It is the story of the life Chippewa’s struggle to preserve their culture and land. It resembles the life and people of Turtle mountain reservation in North Dakota. The novel is a true window to the cultural life of Chippewa tribe. It is set during the historical period of the Dawes Allotment Act of 1887.
The novel is presented in nine chapters. It narrates the life of Chippewa community living in North Dakota between the winter of 1912 and the spring of 1924. Each chapter is identified by year and by season, and the Chippewa name of each season. The date serves as markers of the plot’s linear progression, and the naming of the seasons reminds the readers of the cyclical nature of traditional Chippewa time. Although Erdrich did not publish Tracks until 1988, she worked on versions of its manuscript for many years.
The story is told in the Chippewa oral tradition, and employs a dual narration structure. Nanapush and Pauline are the two narrators of the novel. Nanapush is the aging tribal leader. It opens from the point of view of the narrator, Nanapush. Nanapush, the tribal leader is telling Lulu about the story of her mother’s (Fleur Pillager) continuous struggle. Pauline is a young girl of mixed breed. She exhibits Euro-American consciousness. Pauline’s narration directly relates to her life. . But on the other hand Nanapush narrates the story of his community. The central character of
…show more content…
It mainly focuses on the survival and resistance as themes. It analyses on how natives find their own identity and how they resist the traumatic experience of cultural mixing and cultural alienation in the Euro-American dominated society. It critically assesses how Erdrich literary presents the reconstructing identity in the novel. The chapter also deals with the functions of subcultures in a society and the relevance of the cultural

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    Essay #2 In the prose text Little Bull, Blair Yoxall uses references to the passage of time to draw attention to the aspects of morality that are mutable, as well as the inertia that is characteristic of others. In providing this perspective on the relationship between time and morality, Yoxall is able to demonstrate how the aspects of an individual’s morality that have the greatest tendency to change are those for which they will be held accountable by external sources. Accordingly, the exhibition of resistance to the development in moral standards is observed when accountability is no longer a factor.…

    • 1248 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The film “Century of Genocide in the Americas: the Residential School Experience” is a testimony to the atrocity and cruelty the white people incurred upon the Indians. The film shortly portrays the bizarre picture of the reservation where each and every day the Indians were killed, maimed, raped and denied human rights in varied forms. The film cites the second article of the 1948 Genocide Convention “Genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group…” It conveys the message that white people committed genocide on the Indians. The writer of the article “Gee, You Don’t Seem like an Indian from the Reservation.”…

    • 836 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    External Identity Factors

    • 635 Words
    • 3 Pages

    External Factors and Identity The Webster Dictionary definition of Identity is, “the distinguishing character or personality of an individual.” Many things influence our identity. Not all of them are good or positive. Our identities make us who we are and how we live our life.…

    • 635 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    It’s fascinating how people have been able to make so many different definitions for the word culture; a word that was thought to have one singular definition. People of all cultures are unique not just in their methods and ways of life, but also in their definitions of culture. One person can describe culture as something that can bring family and a community together, but another person may define it as the exact opposite; something that tears people apart and in turn will rip apart a community. Neither of them are wrong or right however, because culture is something that is tangible. Culture is something that changes with time instead of against it.…

    • 1377 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Tragedy eventually strikes, and a daughter is lost to a poisonous snake bite. After this, the women of the family leave both the village and the preacher behind to embark on their own journeys. The last part of the novel covers their separate lives, with a focus on how Africa stuck with them. In the beginning, matriarch Orleanna seems to be the most important character.…

    • 738 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    D’Arcy McNickle, in his final novel, Wind from an Enemy Sky, is able to clearly convey to the reader his personal views regarding the future of Native American culture as it is subjected to the pressure of the American legislative system. These ideas are conveyed through both the progression of the storyline and the individual roles, with intertwined actions, of each of the story’s well calculated characters. This paper will first summarize the plot of Wind from an Enemy Sky and will then explore the views of D’Arcy McNickle regarding the state of Native America through the analysis of select characters from his novel. Wind from an Enemy Sky begins as Bull, a respected elder and leader among the Native Americans of Little Elk, learns of a newly…

    • 1165 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Choctaw Tribe Analysis

    • 1647 Words
    • 7 Pages

    The Choctaw Native Americans lived in the southeast area of the United States and developed a relationship with the French colonial immigrants. An unknown author recounted his understanding of Choctaw rituals, social structure, the role of women, marriage ceremonies, relationship with the French, and more. Although the exact date of this document is unknown, it is speculated it was written in the late 1700s or early 1800s. This Frenchman was a product of his time, place, and culture. Therefore, he held beliefs and understandings vastly different from that of the Choctaw natives.…

    • 1647 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The misrepresentation of Native Americans in The Professor’s House is a prime example of how early American literature chooses to falsely romanticize the southwest. Willa Cather follows this pattern with the characters Father Duchene, Tom Outland, and the professor, Godfrey St. Peter. Together these characters create a dangerous false narrative outside the novel. The problematic characterization of Native Americans is initiated by Duchene, lived by Outland, and is preserved by the professor. Although the novel pays little attention to Native Americans in the novel, the little it does share is enough to understand Cather’s lack of historical awareness.…

    • 1529 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Hammurabi Code Analysis

    • 1509 Words
    • 7 Pages

    1) Culture is a group of community, who shares common belief and experiences which shape the world of their understanding, including political belief, race, religion, national, origin, and gender. Understanding of culture is important, because it can give person to analyze things from different prospective. It also provides opportunity to better understand each other and way of life, which will bring two together. 2) With the invention of writing, there was no need of memory, speech, and rely on person to person interaction to transmit information. The need of simple way of record keeping and organizing of agricultural and business information of the Sumerians to the pictograms, and phonograms.…

    • 1509 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    This book is not a typical novel; it is a composition of many interconnected short stories that share the same characters. The short stories show different perspectives of life on the Spokane Indian Reservation, and each short story shows the struggle of the characters on the reservation in some way. The setting of this story, the Spokane Indian Reservation, shows us some of the plight that the modern Native American, born and raised on a reservation, faces. A majority of the short stories have a somber setting. For example, in the short story “Because My Father Always Said He Was the Only Indian Who Saw Jimi Hendrix Play ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ at Woodstock”, Alexie shows Victor’s experience in a hostile household.…

    • 1335 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    What Influences Culture Culture is a blend of beliefs, ideas, values, bloodlines, communication patterns, artistic expressions, and ways of life. In many ways, culture makes up every part of a human, it makes them unique and at the same time culture is capable of uniting people. Culture defines how people identify themselves, how people act, and it even defines how people think. People view the world and the things that compose it in different ways, these ways are composed of a variety of factors, and those factors compose one’s culture, factors such as, how one was raised, the environment that said person was raised in, and societal stigmas and norms.…

    • 1212 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Character Of Ellie Linton

    • 992 Words
    • 4 Pages

    1. Describe each of the main characters. Ellie Linton was brought up on a cattle farm on the edge of Wirawee. She is the voice of the story. With her independents and resilience, makes her a good contribution to the group.…

    • 992 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Culture is a way of life for a group of people—behaviors, beliefs and values are all shaped by culture. Culture is a relative concept because different cultural groups think, feel and act differently. There is no scientific way of proving one group is superior or inferior to another. Anthropologist Clifford Geertz described culture as a “web of significance”—what he means by this is that culture is a semiotic concept. Culture, as seen by Geertz, is not “complexes of concrete behavior patterns” but as a set of control mechanisms.…

    • 1129 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    A culture is the identity of a place. It includes some aspects such as entertainment, education, and people’s lifestyles. Because people who live in different regions show different ways of living, the culture in one place is different from the cultures of other places. Both residents from big cities and small towns have their own unique culture. Although it’s complicated for people to perfectly understand the comparisons between the culture of different places, there are three differences and a similarity between the culture of a small town and the culture of a big city. The first difference between the culture of a small town and the culture of a big city is in the area of entertainment.…

    • 725 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Culture is a main factor that determines the action of an individual and also help other person of different particular group understand these systems of value, belief, artifacts and behavior. Which helps to embody, a society way of life culture can be identified as a language, multiculturalism social problems social institutions material and social values? Language and culture are referred in book titled Introduction to the study of society as a “body of words and the system for their use of common to people of the same community or nation, the same geographical area or the cultural tradition” (p.70). Language is very vital in our society. It is the way in which individuals communicate which is important for the collaboration of student with…

    • 736 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays