Betrayal.

Works Cited:

Bird, Gloria. "Towards a Decolonization of the Mind and Text 1: Leslie Marmon Silko's "Ceremony"" Wicazo Sa Review, Vol 9, No. 2 Autumn 1993. University of Minnesota Press. 04 Jan. 2009 .

Silko, Leslie Marmon. Ceremony (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition). New York: Penguin Books, 2006.

Summary:

Gloria Bird begins the essay by talking about how people are living results of their colonization.  She talks of how stories, songs, and knowledge will be gone because of people passing away but then soon realizes that this is not necessarily true.  She recalls a song that she still knows even without the existence of the people who began it.  She then feels as though she is stealing a language because her mother was multilingual and she only spoke in English.  

 

Bird claims that readers must learn to 'see' the world differently if they want to understand this work. This is the fundamental challenge of critical fictions. This is referencing Ceremony, a novel that pushes a person to see the world through different eyes.  She explains that the challenge is getting the reader to view reality through the perceptions of the native other.  This means that the reader would put him or herself into the story and try to experience the story through the native's eyes.  She explains that when Silko writes Ceremony in fragments, explains how each thing belongs to something else.  This means that the fragments are connected in some way and come together at the end to have more meaning.  Perhaps Tayo never noticed little things as much as he did after going through a traumatic war experience.  

 

Bird says that nothing was all good or all bad either.  She says that it all depends.  Gloria Bird explains that we must be willing to see the world differently and then references Ku'oosh by talking of how he uses old language to talk to Tayo.  None of the words were his own.  

 

 Bird then discusses Auntie and how she always went to church and said she was a Christian to save her own soul.  She always went by herself.  Silko's strategy was to present Tayo and Auntie's tribal historicity.  

 

Gloria Bird continues to give many examples of how people need to learn to see the world differently.  She explains that she now knows that Western culture has known all along of the potential for language's capacity to create.

 

Application:

When reading both Bird’s essay and Ceremony, one major thing sticks out to me.  Betrayal.  Throughout these two pieces of work, much betrayal is woven throughout them.  In Ceremony, Auntie should be able to be trusted because she is Tayo’s guardian.  Tayo shows her much respect even though she does not respect him.  She treats him as if he is a burden on her and also an embarrassment.  Tayo has mixed blood and Auntie is ashamed to have someone in the family that is of a different ethnicity.  She is also ashamed of Tayo’s mother for having a mixed boy like Tayo.  This is a form of betrayal.  It is true that Auntie takes Tayo in and takes care of him but Tayo can tell that she is ashamed of him and he cannot help but feel betrayed by his own family. Also, Tayo struggles with trusting many different people including his “friend,” Emo.  “He knew

Then that they were not his friends but had turned against him…He was not sure why he was crying, for the betrayal or because they were lost.  (Ceremony 225)  These people acted as his friends before but Tayo finally realized that he had been betrayed and that he was alone and afraid.  Although he was shocked that his older friends would do this to him, I do not think that he was nearly as surprised when it was Emo.  Emo and Tayo always had a rocky relationship and I think that Tayo saw it coming.  Betrayal is one of the strongest forces of disappointment and Gloria Bird and Tayo both felt the same way in the face of it.

In her essay, Gloria bird sends a message that she has betrayed her family.  Although she does not actually say the word, anyone can tell that this is how she feels.  “I must recognize that I am also the product of colonization in that I speak English though my mother is multilingual.”  Internalizing the colonizer’s terms regarding the axiom of our Otherness and obvious difference, she spoke Indian around me only when she wanted to exclude me.”  This is also showing a bit of embarrassment.  Bird’s mother was obviously a bit ashamed that her daughter did not know their language.  Bird felt betrayed when her mother excluded her this way and she felt as if she wasn’t good enough for her family. 

Another thing that comes to mind about these two pieces of writing is the religion or culture in both of them.  Auntie is a Christian woman which is a lot of the reason that she is ashamed of Tayo being of mixed decent.  Bird’s essay claims that the songs and stories of her religion and culture would be gone when the older people pass.  “In what may appear to be a contradiction, I catch myself thinking in my mother’s colonized version of reality:  that once the old people are gone, the songs, the stories, the knowledge will be lost.”  She then realizes that as time goes on, these stories and song are still passed throughout her culture and that is how even today, she knows them.  

Towards decolonization ot the mind and text

Gloria Bird begins the essay by talking about how people are living results of their colonization.  She talks of how stories, songs, and knowledge will be gone because of people passing away but then soon realizes that this is not necessarily true.  She recalls a song that she still knows even without the existence of the people who began it.  She then feels as though she is stealing a language because her mother was mulitlingual and she only spoke in English.  

"Readers must learn to 'see' the world differently if they want to understand this work. This is the fundamental challenge of critical fictions." (4)  This is referencing Ceremony, a novel that pushes a person to to see the world through different eyes.  She explains that the challenge is getting the reader to "view reality through the perceptions of the native other."  This means that the reader would put him or herself into the story and try to experience the story through the native's eyes.  She explains that when Silko writes Ceremony in fragments, explains how each thing belongs to something else.  This means that the fragments are connected in some way and come together at the end to have more meaning.  Perhaps Tayo never noticed little things as much as he did after going through a traumatic war experience.  "Nothing was all good or all bad either; it all depended."(4)  Gloria birds explains that we must be willing to ee the world differently and then references Ku'oosh by talking of how he uses old language to talk to Tayo.  None of the words were his own.  

Bird then discusses Auntie and how she always went to church and said she was a Christian to save her own soul.  She always went by herself.  Silko's strategy was to present Tayo and Auntie's tribal historicity.  

Gloria Bird continues to give many examples of how peopleneed to learn to see the world differently.  She explains that she now knows that Western culture has known all along of the potential for language's capacity to create." (7)

christianity, cattle, and night swan

P. 62-63 covers the theme of Christianity as a coercive force of assimilation. By what means does this occur and what feelings does it evoke?

Tayo claims that him and Auntie understood one another very well.  This is a very coercive force of assimilation because it is sort of showing two different cultures or races coming together.  Even though Auntie was ashamed of Tayo being a mixed person, she can still relate to him.  This shows that race isn't everything and that even different people can identify with one another.  

"An old sesitivity had descended in her, surviving thousands of years from the oldest times, when the people shared a single clan name and they told each other who they were; they recounted the actions and words and actions each of their clan had taken, and would take; from before they were born and long after they died, the people shared the same consciousness."  (p. 62)

This passage also shows the assimilation of cultures.  It shows how things have changed but also how they have stayed the same.  The would share ideas with one another.  This is how Auntie and Tayo acted toward one another.  It is obvious that Auntie cares for Tayo but it is also obvious that she is ashamed of him.  Christianity in these circumstances is kind of the same way; accepting of some things but critical of others.

We learn of Josiah’s new cattle business and of the almost wild Mexican cattle he buys. What symbolic associations do the Mexican cattle carry? (Consider breeds and breeding, contrast with Herefords, where they go, and relation to nature, fences etc).

Josiah says that when an animal feels like they are lost, they don't usually live for long time after.  The fences have a big significance to this.  The cattle break out of the fence to be free because they do not want to be stuck in one place and feel that they are imprisoned.  On the other hand, these cattle had no other choice than to roam across the land because there was a major drought and they had no other way to get water or food.  There was no grass to eat or water to drink and the cattle could have died either way but had a better chance to escape and survive on their own.  Josiah read a book to help him care for his cattle but realized that maybe the book doesn't help him because it was written by "white men" that haven't been in the conditions that Josiah was in.  He wanted to raise a different kind of cattle and this symbolizes the differences in cultures.  

We are also introduced to Josiah’s Mexican lover, the Flamenco dancer, Night Swan. What do we find out about her? What significance attaches to her character? What’s with all the blue? How does what she tells Tayo connect with elements that come up in other parts of the novel?

Night Swan is Josiah's "grilfriend."  She is an older lady and is portrayed as being smart and sexy.  She is also a mixed individual like Tayo.  She would dance in Flamenco to attract men when she was a younger girl.  She seduces Tayo.  Night Swan is a character in the story that acts sort f as a teacher.  She teaches him of change and that it is alright to have change in your life.  I believe that what she tells Tayo is foreshadowing the rest of the novel.

Given what you have read so far (esp. the Pueblo stories, the Hopi film, and Silko essays), what connections can you draw between the first few pages (the poems) of Ceremony and these materials?

From reading the beginning of Ceremony, I have come to the conclusion that land and animals were, and still are, a big part of the indian heritage.  As we were watching the film and class and reading the Silko essays, I have come to the realization that these people need these animals to survive.  In the beginning of the novel, there is a part that talk about Tayo gaining a sense of calmness from thinking of a deer in his mind.  In the readings that we did, the animals provided a sense of comfort because they meant that the people would have all the food that they needed.  Also, in Ceremony, there is a drought and none of the food is growing and the animals are starving becuase there is no grass or anthing for them to consume.  In the readings, there was a sense of understanding that if there was no way to feed the animals, there was no way for them to feed themselves.  In the origin myth story, the sisters were not able to make more seeds because there was not yet enough food for the new animals to consume.  These things are a big factor in the way of life for these people.

Describe, as best as you can, Auntie’s attitudes about Tayo, mixed blood, and religion.

Auntie seems to be a very self-conscience person that worries about what everyone else thinks.  She is ashamed that her nephew is a biracial person and she is embarassed of her sister for having Tayo with a man from a different race.  She comes off as thinking that she is a very christian woman but I can't help but think that she is not because it is not a christian-like attitude to be ashamed of your own family.  She looks down on people that have mixed blood.  She acts as a martyr but does not show it justly.  

The author of "She Had Some Horses" is representing a female speaker reconciling contradictory personal feelings about men.  She is saying that she has had some men that have been good to her and others that have not treated her kindly.  The poem is about the different types of men that the author has had in her life and the "horses" represent "men."  This poem shows a woman's despair when it comes to a man.  I believe that the horses are male. The author is a woman and the end suggests that they are men by saying that they had raped her.  There are many lines that contradict themselves.  For example, one line say that she had horses who had no names and horses with books of names.  This suggests that her feelings weren't completely negative as the feeling of the poem gives a negative vibe

"She had horses who danced in their mothers' arms.

She had horses who thought they were the sun and their

bodies shone and burned like stars.

She had horses who waltzed nightly on the moon.

She had horses who were much too shy, and kept quiet

in stalls of their own making."

This stanza represents a feminist sensibility. The last lines of the poem help to provide a resolution. I was confused as to whether or not the horses represented men until the last line when it says, "she had horses who tried to sve her, who climbed in her bed at night and prayed as they raped her."  This suggests that the horses in the poem were men that treated her unjustly.  This poem is the author's way of expressing the hurt but also the love that she has experienced.