Final thoughts about Four Souls

Is this a happy ending? Thinking about today's discussion over again, I now have the feeling that the ending of "Four Souls" is bittersweet. I think its great that they got their precious land, but at the same time, the forces of vengence (from Fleur) and importance of the land really take away from the meaning of ownership. Fleur loses her souls and obligations, like being a mother, because of the need to keep land. This importance makes the land more of an object of property thus giving success to the white developers who would want them to view land as something to be bought, sold, developed, traded, etc. This is a bittersweet ending because it leaves the natives looking more like those they are trying to keep the land away from while being happy with the little cultural autonomy that remains.

symbolism in the Sioux

After the discussion of The Soft-Hearted Sioux, I became really interested in the symbolism of the color red because of the many references made in the story. I looked up the meaning of the color red and for the Sioux, it means life. This makes a lot of sense in the story because of the main events surrounding the son's attempts to save his father's life. I find the last paragraph very significant to the symbolism found in the Sioux beliefs. The last paragraph says "soon I shall know, for now I see the east is growing red. My heart is strong. My face is calm. My eyes are dry and eager for new scences." I also discovered that east symbolises "beginning" which makes this paragraph significant to what was going on in the story where he is being put to death. His eagerness for "new scenes" is the beginning of a new life, which he previously pondered about in the story. I think I might use examples like this one in my third essay about point of view and its effects. Something like how the use of first person point of view reveals inner thoughts and with the use of symbolism, like the use of the color red, brings the inner thoughts to the readers attention?

Thoughts about Tribal Chant

Carol Lee Sanchez's poem "Tribal Chant" reminded myself a lot of my cultural identity. Insights into the poem suggests that Carol is of mixed heritage and struggles with her association with each nationality she belongs to. What sticks out to me is when she says "se llanto plays in my head" because to me it means that she is sad about her confusion. It could be that the situations and setting she was it at the time she wrote this poem were issues that made it a difficult time in finding herself. That insight is what I can relate to situations with my family. Sometimes I have felt l cannot understand what relatives of full blood are saying or meaning when they talk or do certain things, and it does create initial feelings of being stuck in between and dual identity. It doesnt sadden me, which is feel can be a tone of the Tribal chant, but it puts me in a place to decide whether I want to feel stuck in the middle or learn and put in the effort to be seen as apart of each cultural identity. I have felt I needed to work extra hard in knowing each traditional ways, not for acceptance, but for growing deeper, closer relationships. I think being of mixed heritage is interesting and adds character to a person that can associate much with different cultural ways. As Avila would advocate, it is important to associate with your roots.

Assimulation or Inevitable

For this weeks blog, I want to share a few of my ideas about the "Wounded Knee" film. The perspectives of the native Indians was very appealing and I have much sympathy for the natives who directly or indirectly are involved or been involved in a tragic event. Whether it be racist murders, or native children taken from their families and culturally transformed at boarding schools, American growth into the nation it has become today has both it's benefits and its negatives. The filmed drew on a lot of the negatives, but I wanted to think about the opposite end of the spectrum. I'm not in agreement with things like seizing land or genocide (like back in the Wounded Knee Creek event in 1890), but after watching the film Ipondered about the possible ways of peaceful assimulation. I don't think that it was justified to kill or steal from the natives as it was done in the past, but eventually the cultures needed to merge quickly, and at that time there was no other alternative available. In a sense, if the natives were left alone they wouldnt have access to modern technology and medicine needed for everyday living and health changes. It's almost as if it were inevitable that the cultures needed to assimulate in order to live within the same regions. I do not agree with the violent acts, or the selfishness of people like Dick Wilson on the reservations, but the conflicts like the film portrayed ended with an agreement and understanding with too much in between. Was it worth the lives of both the natives and the US government officials to spend that many days in conflict? Since the matter was a large scale need for change, it may have been impossible to protest for change in a peaceful manner. I'm curious about this generation of native Indians and how much they are attached to their traditional ways and culture. It seems as though America is approaching assimulation in the present day with more attractive techniques. For example, the Indian gaming casinos throughout California.

Thompson's creation of the World

Lucy Thompson's story of the creation of the world was very interesting in that God created man and woman pure, but also created sin. Why would God just create the experience of sin as it happened with the snake? In comparison to my own religious ideology, sin was just brought upon to them, not something made from the humans or another naturally sinful thing. There seems to be no purpose of the creation of people other than to "marry and bring forth children" (71). This sparks interesting thoughts of indigenous living. Did they know what they served for as individuals of a simple world?

Blog title and Popol Vuh

I chose to title my blog "behold the cities of gold" because it relates to part of my ancestry. Being of mixed heritage, part of my family has origins in Mexico City. In the present day, it is difficult to distinguish if you have ancestry from many cultural groups of the native Indians of mesoamerica of the 14th, 15th, and 16th centuries, but Mexico city is the present city of what used to be the capital of the Aztec empire. So for purposes of choosing a title, the maker's of gold is what some historians believed the Spanish called the Aztec Indians, and I chose it to make reference to part of my cultural heritage. The NAS course looked at Popol Vuh, which is the book if the creation of people from the Mayans, who were close relatives to the Aztecs.

In thinking of the writing assisgnment for next week, I think I am choosing to stay with the Popol Vuh. An interesting theme I find which s is helping me to start my draft is the idea of light and darkness. It was pointed out in class the references in the text about darkness and it raised questions because the creation of the sun and moon had yet to happen. In Christianity, light and dark can refer to good and evil. An example relating the good/evil with light/darkness is found in book two with the trickery the brothers played on the lord's of the "underworld." This shows some prevailance of good over evil which raises my thoughts that Mayans may have shared many beliefs to my own religious ideology.