In the poetry collection Whereas by Layli Long Soldier, there is a intense division between Native American tribes and The United States government. In 2009, in an attempt to rectify this divide, the United States Congress issues an apology on to all the tribes they wronged. Long Soldier, a Lakota woman uses the entire second half of her novel to rebuke an apology she deems inadequate. Initially when analyzing her writing, it seems nonsensical and unorganized. This collection disrupts typical conventions of writing to illustrate the nonsensical manner in which the Congressional Apology was written and delivered. Through her poems, the author makes the reader feel confused and ignorant of her culture, and consequently allows her readers to feel
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In 2009, President Barack Obama signed the Congressional Resolution of Apology to Native Americans. The apology was full of confusing law jargon and did not fully take the blame of the wrongs committed towards Native tribes. Long Soldier recognized the true superficial nature of this apology, and committed the entire second half of her book to mocking it. The title of the second section is called “Whereas”(Soldier 57). This comes directly from the Congressional apology, where every statement in the joint resolution started with “Whereas”. All of Soldier’s works start with the word “whereas”, parallel to the apology. This is a direct mockery of the jargon used in the apology, to emphasize its ridiculousness and how when it is repeated so many times, loses all meaning and becomes nothing. Layli Long Soldier does not consider the language and delivery of this apology to be sufficient enough to even begin to amend the wrongs against her people. An example of this is shown when she describes how she accepts apologies. She states that she watches the person delivering the apology, “[the] movement the shoulders high or folding, tilt of the …show more content…
Long Soldier's entire collection is a product of her passionate feelings toward this resolution. Her anger is evident in one of her poems where she creates a metaphor, relating her tooth decay to the damage the United States government has inflicted on Native tribes. Long Soldier paints a picture of her visiting the dentist for a tooth pain, but at the Indian Health services, fundings are so low they do not have the means to fix her tooth. She states “the solution offered: pull it...a tooth that could’ve been saved was placed into my palm....”(Long Soldier 84). Her tooth was repairable, but the health clinic did not have the capacity to repair it. She compares this damage to the United States Government by stating that “the root of reparation is gone”(Long Soldier 84). The United States has already done such irreparable damage to the Native American tribes, no apology can fully heal it, especially such a weak apology. The government has caused Native American people to be so pushed behind the rest of the world, it would be nearly impossible for them to ever feel total equality to their non-minority counterparts. Her comparison of having a painful procedure to remove a curable tooth depicts the intense scarring the United States government has caused, that her people will never recover from. Another way Long Soldier manipulates language to deconstruct the Native American Resolution is when she
In 2009, President Barack Obama signed the Congressional Resolution of Apology to Native Americans. The apology was full of confusing law jargon and did not fully take the blame of the wrongs committed towards Native tribes. Long Soldier recognized the true superficial nature of this apology, and committed the entire second half of her book to mocking it. The title of the second section is called “Whereas”(Soldier 57). This comes directly from the Congressional apology, where every statement in the joint resolution started with “Whereas”. All of Soldier’s works start with the word “whereas”, parallel to the apology. This is a direct mockery of the jargon used in the apology, to emphasize its ridiculousness and how when it is repeated so many times, loses all meaning and becomes nothing. Layli Long Soldier does not consider the language and delivery of this apology to be sufficient enough to even begin to amend the wrongs against her people. An example of this is shown when she describes how she accepts apologies. She states that she watches the person delivering the apology, “[the] movement the shoulders high or folding, tilt of the …show more content…
Long Soldier's entire collection is a product of her passionate feelings toward this resolution. Her anger is evident in one of her poems where she creates a metaphor, relating her tooth decay to the damage the United States government has inflicted on Native tribes. Long Soldier paints a picture of her visiting the dentist for a tooth pain, but at the Indian Health services, fundings are so low they do not have the means to fix her tooth. She states “the solution offered: pull it...a tooth that could’ve been saved was placed into my palm....”(Long Soldier 84). Her tooth was repairable, but the health clinic did not have the capacity to repair it. She compares this damage to the United States Government by stating that “the root of reparation is gone”(Long Soldier 84). The United States has already done such irreparable damage to the Native American tribes, no apology can fully heal it, especially such a weak apology. The government has caused Native American people to be so pushed behind the rest of the world, it would be nearly impossible for them to ever feel total equality to their non-minority counterparts. Her comparison of having a painful procedure to remove a curable tooth depicts the intense scarring the United States government has caused, that her people will never recover from. Another way Long Soldier manipulates language to deconstruct the Native American Resolution is when she