In my hometown of Fuquay-Varina, diversity was hard to come by. Besides the typical suburban prep-kid or the cowboy who drove his tractor to school that one day in February, the most diverse we ever got was when the annual corn and tobacco festival that summoned the hidden, free-spirited hippies from their dark corners and come out into the eyes of the town. But even then there were only about three of them and as soon as they bought their yearly supply of deep-friend corn patties (because face it, who can deny deep-fried corn patties?) they went quickly back to where they came from. However, when I reached eighth grade, our town witnessed the most bizarre thing to happen since a Fuquayan attempted to unicycle; a family of American Indians moved to town.
The oldest, Jordan, was my age and he was placed in almost all of my classes. Even though he spoke perfect English, everyone insisted to greet him like he didn’t know English at all. A “HOW,” accompanied by a stern fist on the chest was the usual greeting given to Jordan. You could see it in his eyes that he was annoyed but didn’t want to say anything because he was the new kid. Somehow he ended up in my close-knit group of friends and he quickly became the “token-Indian kid.” Every Halloween he dressed up like a Plains’ Indian, full-feathered headdress, moccasins, and a makeshift machete. No one really ever asked Jordan if it bothered him… we all had too much fun with our Indian friend who had really cool scary stories about his family.
Looking back, I don’t think I ever even took the time to ask him where his heritage lay. He could be Cherokee, Crow, Navajo, or anything else for that matter. My only clue was that Jordan once told me he hated all country music because of what the Cowboys did to the Indians… Anyways, all our friends and I just saw was, “Indian.” I can see now how we stereotyped Jordan making him the blunt of all our jokes without ever getting to know his background or the uniqueness of his family history.
I feel awful now that I look back at my friendship with him, but the more I think about it, the more I begin to question how much Jordan actually liked the attention. I’m not justifying how we treated Jordan, but after awhile he seemed to boast in his newfound identity, sometimes referring himself as Little J-Walk. I almost wonder if he lost a lot of himself to a larger, generic version of the televised American Indian because that's what we kept enforcing on him. But it’s understandable if you look at Jordan’s story… how he moved to an almost completely Caucasian town where people weren’t that informed on American Indians. Heck, I still don’t think many Americans realize that there is more than one type of Indian. We just assume that what’s portrayed on television reflects the actual world. But it absolutely does not.
After watching “Reel Injun” I felt what most fellow empathetic Caucasians call “White Guilt.” I know that I had nothing to do with the extraction and forced-exodus of thousands of American Indians from their homelands, or the slaughter at Wounded Knee, or even the movies that depicted Indians as blood-thirsty savages, but somehow I still felt guilty simply because it was my “race” that did do those things. I wanted to run to the nearest reservation and find the first Indian and apologize for how my ancestors treated their ancestors. As silly as that sounds, I have some desire to reconcile the past. The same thing applies to being Christian and remembering the awful people responsible for the Crusades or all the other hypocrisy and injustice in the Church. I just hate being thrown in the same category as those who have done horrible things out of my control. I see how enraged some American Indian activists can get and I want to shake my fist and scream, “WHY ARE YOU MAD AT ME? IT WASN’T ME!” I get mad sometimes because as much progress as America has made through civil rights and enforcing political correctness, I sometimes feel that American Indians refuse to stop holding the past over our ignorant, racist, White heads. They refuse to let the White people forget what "we've done." And because of that it's almost like they are prohibiting progress as much as White people are. This is not saying that I want everyone to forget what happened and to not learn from the past, but I do think that holding on to anger won't get the Indian nation where they want to go. I also think that Americans who aren't exposed to the history of the American Indians and remaining ignorant is just as deadly to the prospect of a reconciled America.
I don’t want this to sound all cheesy or cliché, but I do think that by taking this course I can somehow rectify a tribute Jordan and to the nation of American Indians. Maybe through looking at samples of their literature, exploring their history and legacy, and uncovering the misleading stereotypes I can somehow develop a deeper appreciation for their culture and history. Maybe through this course I can free myself of this White Guilt and begin to imagine a world where the two nations can come together.
No comments:
Post a Comment