Reincarnating Fatherhood in Aboriginal Fiction
allyson anderson
Le père comme archétype littéraire have higher unemployment rates, family—a ubiquitous and genocidal du roman autochtone d’Amérique du lower average income, higher rates colonial practice known as assimila- Nord peut être vu comme une victime of illness, and a significantly shorter tion through miscegenation. issue du processus de colonisation et life span than the general Euro- The emasculation of Aboriginal connue comme le proverbial “indien North American population. Ab- males, a process inveterate to colo- disparu”. L’auteure affirme que le père original males are most at-risk for nization, is embodied in the arche- absent est souvent mentionné par les suicidal behaviours among North typal figure of Tonto: a once-was- auteurs autochtones au sens propre ou Americans (Krug et al. 8; Health a-warrior-turned-sidekick to the au figuré pour décrire le vide laissé par Canada; Rhoades 774; who 189). colonial hero. Tonto is to the Lone les pères absents dans les sociétés au- Perhaps for the above reasons, Ranger as Friday to Crusoe: both tochtones. L’article a remarqué que la the absentee father appears to be a represent the quintessential “good fiction autochtone suggère que les fils figure much visited by Aboriginal native” (read subjugated) whose devraient aussi rejeter la définition co- authors, articulating (either liter- power, if any, is sublimated to that loniale de la masculinité autochtone, ally or metaphorically) the rift in of the colonizer. In the colonial restaurer leur relation avec la femme et Aboriginal societies left by fathers grand narrative, the Fridays, Tobys, la terre-mère, (ré)clamer leur rôle dans not present. Often, these fictive fa- and Tontos never get the bad guy, la sphère familiale et par le fait même thers die (illness, suicide, murder), never save the day (not by them- (re)définir la virilité de l’autochtone or abandon their families, such as selves, anyway) and never get the non seulement pour eux-mêmes mais in N. Scott Momaday’s House Made girl. By the standards of both colo- pour les générations à venir. of Dawn and Lee Maracle’s Raven- nial and Aboriginal societies, Tonto song. When the father is present, he is rendered impotent, both figura- Where have all the Aboriginal fa- tends to be emotionally unavailable tively and quite literally.12 Tonto is thers gone? The Father as a liter- because he is abusive, addicted, or not the Aboriginal warrior, but the ary archetype in North American just plain ineffectual—as is Victor’s warrior subverted. He represents Aboriginal fiction can be seen as a father in Sherman Alexie’s short fic- both a sexual and physical threat: in casualty of colonial process, em- tion. At times the absentee father order to secure the primacy of the bodying the proverbial “vanishing appears as an uncle, compelled to Euro-colonial male, the Aboriginal Indian.” Where Aboriginal women, keep a distance from his progeny— warrior must die, if not literally, it has been argued, have enjoyed the result of an illicit affair, as in then symbolically—transformed some continuity of their social role Tomson Highway’s Dry Lips Oughta into a metaphorical eunuch. as mothers and managers of home/ Move to Kapuskasing and Eden Rob- It is no wonder, then, that Ab- community (although devalued in inson’s Monkey Beach. Sometimes original Fathers—and notions of western culture), Aboriginal men he is erased completely—replaced Aboriginal masculinities more gen- have suffered centuries of social/ by a Euro-North American—as erally—manifest themselves as a political emasculation as well as a in Thomas King’s Medicine River, “dark horse” in the Aboriginal lit- deskilling and devaluing of their echoing a colonial process that both erary imagination: Tonto has left labour in the economic arena. In displaced Aboriginal manhood and the building. His absence carries North America, Aboriginal males supplanted him as father in his own profound consequences. Histori-
VOLUME 26, NUMBERS 3,4 179 cally, the cultural transmission of of Aboriginal cultures. In the works leaves the family home: after buying gender roles in many Aboriginal studied here, Alexie, Highway, and a motorcycle, he leaves town, then societies was passed from same-sex King illustrate how the imposition the state, and eventually, the world parent to same-sex child; coloni- of colonial patriarchy on Aboriginal of the living: zation interrupted this pattern of peoples has fragmented generations transmission.2 The authors that I of families, resulting in the anomie [W]ith that bike my dad chose for this comparative analysis experienced by many Aboriginal learned something new about are Aboriginal males whose works males, and their consequent es- running away…. He lived in examine those points of cultural trangement (physical, mental, emo- Seattle, San Francisco, Los An- disruption from a male point of tional, and spiritual) from Aborigi- geles, before he finally ended up view: an approach that not only nal women and children. in Phoenix. For a while, it was offers insight into father/son rela- postcards every week. Then it tionships from a qualitatively dif- was once a month. Then it was ferent perspective than we might What better way on Christmas and my birthday. encounter from Aboriginal women to “divide and (Alexie 32-34) authors, but also adds another di- mension to our understanding of conquer” a people Similarly, Medicine River docu- how Aboriginal peoples experience than to turn the ments the truant behaviour of the the effects of colonization in their protagonist’s father. The novel be- interpersonal lives. men against their gins with a series of “un-love” letters Using Thomas King’s Medicine own women? from Will’s father to his mother, River, Tomson Highway’s Dry Lips The restoration Rose. This “deadbeat dad’s” infre- Oughta Move to Kapuskasing and quent correspondence contains the selected short stories from Sherman of men’s “right typical rhetoric: questionable tales Alexie’s The Lone Ranger and Tonto relationship” to of his travels, equally questionable Fistfight in Heaven, I will examine excuses for unfulfilled promises, how the absentee father exists as a women is essential missed visits/birthdays/Christmas- literary archetype in this Aboriginal to the survival of es/child support, and the inevitable fiction: both as a social representa- Aboriginal cultures. supplication for forgiveness. Since tion and as a literary device neces- the letters are the sum of the physi- sary for the Aboriginal father to be cal evidence left of her husband, reincarnated in the sons.3 Through Abandonment in one form or an- they are secreted away by Rose in this literary process, which requires other is thematically significant in blue velvet wrapping bound with the use of rhythm, ritual, and rites the three works analyzed here, epit- yellow ribbon, locked in a small of passage, the male protagonist(s) omized by one of Thomas Builds- wooden chest. are able to resurrect traditional no- The-Fire’s eerie insights: Will’s father is not only absent tions of Aboriginal masculinities, from family life—he is also almost (re)create their roles in a contem- [Y]our father’s heart is weak. entirely absent from the family porary context, and (re)define Ab- He is afraid of his own fam- narrative. What the letters actually original manhood in the process, ily. He is afraid of you. Late mean is that Will’s father has for- especially as it relates to their rela- at night he sits in the dark. saken them, and so Rose is deter- tionships with Aboriginal women. Watches the television until mined that she and the boys will According to a Cheyenne adage: there’s nothing but that white forget about him. Rose’s censorship “A nation is not conquered until noise. Sometimes he feels like is so complete he remains nameless, the hearts of its women are on the he wants to buy a motorcycle hinting at his name only once (King ground. Then it is done, no mat- and ride away. He wants to run 1989: 8). Usually, she refers to him ter how brave its warriors nor how and hide. He doesn’t want to be simply as, “your father,” or more strong their weapons” (cited in found. (Alexie 61) anonymously, “someone” (King Lavell and Lavell-Harvard flyleaf). 1989: 123 -24). Even the few pho- What better way to “divide and con- In Alexie’s stories, the absence tographs in the packet reveal little, quer” a people than to pit one half of Victor’s father is multi-layered as the face of Will’s father is always against the other—to turn the men although he lives with the family obscured: a shadow here, a tilt of the against and/or away from their own during Victor’s early childhood, his hat there. An aged photo that Will women? For this reason, the resto- alcoholism renders him both unre- receives from his mother bears the ration of men’s “right relationship” liable and emotionally unavailable. terse editorial marks of a vengeful to women is essential to the survival Eventually, Victor’s father not only (Aboriginal?) cupid:
180 CANADIAN WOMAN STUDIES/LES CAHIERS DE LA FEMME He was leaning against a fence Similar to Highway’s play, Alexie’s the warrior transformed into the in- with four other men. He had and King’s protagonists also engage visible, ineffectual eunuch? Through on a pair of jeans, a work shirt in a quest to know their fathers, and colonization, Aboriginal men have and a hat that was pulled down the primary (sometimes the only) been emasculated in a number of over much of his face. There means by which they can achieve ways, including: the devaluing of was a short letter from my this is through the narratives of oth- their traditional modes of produc- mother with the photograph ers. The only memories Victor has tion (such as hunting and fishing); that said, “Happy birthday. of his father are from his childhood; the mass deskilling of their labour Found this picture. Third from Will has none at all. Their fathers (achieved by streaming them toward the right. That’s him.” And she remain phantoms of speculation unskilled jobs and away from trades signed it “love” like she always and conjecture that can be called or academics); and, discrimination did. That was it. He had a ciga- in the marketplace (systemic and rette hanging from his mouth. overt).5 No skills means no job, and My mother had drawn a circle Through no job means no income. No in- around him with an arrow colonization, come means that Aboriginal fathers pointing at the side of his head. have no way to provide for their (King 86) Aboriginal men have families. Sometimes, some Aborigi- been emasculated nal men must rely either on social With both parents are now dead, welfare programs or their women. their unresolved angst plays out in in a number of Will’s life, where he must come to ways, including: the Five-year-old Victor recalls a know the father in himself—to devaluing of their particularly destitute Christmas father himself—before he can when there was no money for (re)define himself as an Aboriginal traditional modes of gifts: [He cried] “huge, gasping male within the context of his com- production (such as tears. Indian tears…. Just the munity, and ultimately, (re)create week before, Victor had stood his role within it. hunting and fishing); in the shadows of his father’s Throughout the works, the re- the mass deskilling doorway and watched as the lationships that form between the of their labour. man opened his wallet and sons and their fathers are both frag- shook his head. Empty. Victor mented and filtered through the watched his father repeat this lens of the fathers’ relationships to forth only through secondhand ceremony again and again, as if other people, each with their own incantations. For both men, their the repetition itself could guar- angle, agenda, and attitude. This journeys to claim the material arti- antee change. But it was always prismatic rendition of the father is facts left by their fathers become a empty. (Alexie 4) illustrated in the competing narra- quest to reclaim the stories about tives around the paternity and birth them—their only real inheritance. Victor’s father is a fallen warrior of Dickie Bird Halked, from witness The hope lies in that there are in- and ex-con who spent two years Pierre St. Pierre: heritors at all: sons who remember in Walla Walla penitentiary for their fathers enough to care about “beat[ing] the shit out of a National I was there in the same room what happened to them. Things Guard private” at a peace rally in as your mother when she gave could be worse, and are, for some the ‘60s (Alexie 25). When Victor birth to you. So I know well Aboriginal men: laments that his generation of In- who you are and where you dian youths are “rebels without a came from. I remember the When [Victor] was five cause,” his father points out the iro- whole picture. Even though years old, an old Indian man ny of wanting to fight for a nation we were all in a bit of a drowned in a mud puddle at with genocidal tendencies towards fizzy… I remember. Do you the powwow. Just passed out Indians. Because of this history, he know…that you were named and fell facedown into the maintains that, “Indians are pretty after that bar? Anyone ever water collected in a tire track. much born soldiers anyway. Don’t tell you that? …And I’ll never Even at five, Victor understood need a uniform to prove it” (Alexie forgive your father Big Joey what that meant, how it defined 29). … oops … I mean—Welling- nearly everything. (Alexie 7) Big Joey, a fallen warrior from ton Halked, for letting your the glory days of the ’70s Red Power mother do that to you…. How does Aboriginal manhood movement, plays a mostly voyeuris- (Highway 57) fall from grace?4 By what process is tic role as Dickie Bird Halked’s ab-
VOLUME 26, NUMBERS 3,4 181 sentee father, and it is his attempts considered the centre of the house- really is and who his family and to deny his paternal responsibility hold and the givers of life: a perfor- community want him to be. Will that cause Dickie Bird’s condition: mance that they stand and deliver, recalls an incident in which Jake first Big Joey watches silently as even in the face of crushing poverty. was playing in a basketball tourna- the pregnant Black Lady Halked This is an ephemeral talent imbued ment in which he had “fouled out.” drinks herself into a nine-month with the sublime: When his wife January attempts stupor, and again as Dickie Bird as- to comfort him, he first twists her saults Patsy Pegahmagahbow. Point- During these kinds of tiny arm until she cries, then punches edly, Dickie Bird’s assaults Patsy storms, Victor’s mother would her in the face—a very public act Pegahmagahbow with a crucifix. rise with her medicine and of cruelty that is witnessed by the The rape of Patsy Pegahmagahbow magic. team, the crowd, and worst of all, (and her subsequent miscarriage) She would pull air down from the Pretty Weasel children. No one manifests a genocidal misogyny empty cupboards and make fry acts to intervene: they remain pas- transmitted by Christianity, co- bread. She would shake thick sive spectators as though Jake’s bru- lonialism, and patriarchy to gen- blankets free from old bandan- tality is simply part of the spectacle, erations of Aboriginal males—a as. She would comb Victor’s while “January tried to smile, and tried, tested, and true “divide and braids into dreams. (Alexie 5) she waved her hand as if everything conquer” strategy. The characters was okay” (King 45). Big Joey and his son, Dickie Bird It is no wonder that, already feel- January eventually murders Jake, Halked, play out the social disso- ing defeated, disenfranchised, and setting it up to appear as a suicide. nance that is frequently experienced dependent, the warrior regards the Jake’s death allows January to re- by politically, economically, and numinous power of women with a model him from “beast’ to ‘beauty”: culturally marginalized males who mixture of awe and envy, his frustra- she authors a note, ostensibly writ- must survive in patriarchal societ- tion eventually giving way to rage. ten by Jake, that not only transforms ies based on male dominance and Lacking the power to strike out at murder to suicide, but also reforms privilege. The resulting frustration the true source of his anger, the Jake’s selfish past into a final act of caused by this dissonance is too of- warrior implodes, turning inward selflessness: ten redirected as aggression against on himself in a pursuit of self-hat- females, a phenomenon endemic ing destruction (addiction, suicide) Harlen and me figured that Jake to Aboriginal communities. When or explodes in an act of lateral probably shot himself maybe Zachary demands, “Why? Why did violence, lashing out at his family, because he hated himself for you let him do it?” Big Joey’s misog- community, and in particular, Ab- beating on January or because ynistic rant reveals his misplaced an- original women. he was angry at the time and imosity toward Aboriginal women, Impotent male rage, especially as didn’t have anyone else to hit. whom he perceives as traitorous and it is directed at females, is a com- It was funny, in a way. Jake’s emasculating: “[T]hey—our own mon theme in the works discussed suicide, I mean…. We all had women—took the fuckin’ power here. Medicine River contains the Jake stories, and even January away from us faster than the FBI parallel narratives of Mr. Oswald was anxious to tell about the ever did.” To which Spooky Lacroix and Jake Pretty Weasel, both wife times Jake had taken the kids replies, “They always had it” (High- abusers. Mrs. Oswald, a Euro-Ca- shopping or made a special way 120). nadian neighbour of Will’s family, dinner or brought her home Spooky is referring to the high flees the murderous hands of her an unexpected and thoughtful status held by women in many Ab- husband, moves into a new town, present … she seemed to have original societies before and around and re-writes her personal narrative forgotten the beatings and the the time of contact. In these so- for a new audience. She claims to be pain, and in the end, all of us cieties, women enjoyed a certain a widow, expunging Mr. Oswald’s began talking about the letter amount of power, privilege, and more unsavory qualities from the as if Jake had written it. (King prestige in their roles as home/com- tale: that is, until he finds her and 51) munity manager, caregiver, and beats her severely. Afterward, he nurturer—roles that, for many Ab- remains conspicuously absent from The townsfolk, choosing to be- original women, still hold constant her story, while she recasts her very lieve January’s revisionist narrative, today, even if their status has been conspicuous injuries as an “acci- express an eagerness to overlook any savagely demoted by the dominant, dent.” evidence implicating her in Jake’s patriarchal culture (see Anderson The name “Jake Pretty Weasel” death while reconstructing him in 2000). In many contemporary Ab- suggests the duality that arises from their collective memory as every- original societies, women are still the tension of who the character thing he was not: a caring father, a
182 CANADIAN WOMAN STUDIES/LES CAHIERS DE LA FEMME loving husband, a respectable com- out for the men their deepest desires It doesn’t matter which as long as I munity member. as well as their darkest secrets, forc- continue to tell the stories” (Alexie In these works, abusive men are ing them to acknowledge their own 72). not living in “right relationship” personal and collective truths. For Thomas’s visions also feed the to others, and it seems that there example, in the denouement when people spiritually, although they may is no place for violence in Aborigi- Big Joey finally admits to Dickie not always be cognizant or apprecia- nal families who are attempting to Bird’s paternity, his own misogyny, tive of this fact. However, when his restore a sense of balance, wellness, and ultimately his culpability, he father dies, Victor “feels a sudden and continuity in lives that have also tacitly acknowledges his own need for tradition” (Alexie 62), and been disrupted by generations of continued, internalized oppression: seeks Thomas’s help. When Thomas colonization. The Aboriginal father “Wounded Knee … The FBI … throws a house party, he buys all the that was sublimated to the imperi- beat us into the ground. Ever since beer, then sits in the fridge when alist agenda must necessarily vanish that spring, I’ve had these dreams guests complain that it’s empty. The so that a new generation of Aborigi- where blood is spillin’ out from my implicit message is, “eat me” (dou- nal males can (re)define themselves groin, nothin’ there but blood and ble entendre). A can of mushrooms as men, (re)creating their roles in emptiness. It’s like … I lost myself” in corporeal form is later served up “right relationship” to their families (Highway 120). The reconstruc- in a “vision salad” with psychotropic and communities. Subsequently, in tion of Big Joey and Dickie Bird dressing, tossed together by none all three works, the stories by which Halked’s story is central to the play: other than Thomas himself. the sons come to know their fathers it is this reunion, however perverse Like Alice’s “magic mushroom,” are transformative, and ultimately, and grotesque, that exposes the sins Thomas is the drug that allows the redemptive. of the father, allowing the son, and boys to experience alternate realities: Transformation doesn’t occur in ultimately Aboriginal manhood, to “[H]ell, he looked around our world, a vacuum—it needs a catalyst. The heal. and then poked his head through trickster figure is ubiquitous in Ab- One element used in the mythos some hole in the wall into another original mythologies, representing a of many cultures for spiritual heal- world. A better world” (Alexie 14). “wild card” in the mix: an unknown ing and purification is fire. In Alex- Subconsciously, the boys attempt to quantity that can bring chaos, re- ie’s works, it is Thomas Builds-The- recreate something like the peyote store order, and sometimes both at Fire who transforms Victor and the ritual: through the looking-glass once. In all of the works discussed boys’ perceptions and expectations that is Thomas, they experience here, the male characters are led of their realities by showing them their realities transformed. to and through these redemptive alternate realities. Where there’s fire, The transformative power of transformations by trickster figures there’s smoke—a medium of com- Trickster takes on more mundane appearing in three levels of incarna- munication between Aboriginals proportions in Medicine River. tion: The spirit, the shaman, and and the divine. Fire is symbolic of Here, it is Harlen the “storyteller” the storyteller. Thomas’s character on many levels. whose fabrications weave a closely- In Tomson Highway’s works, the Fire, often associated with the male knit community: Trickster is a genderless spirit being, principle, is ancient and elemen- a shape-shifter, who has an often- tal: a constant, yet ever-changing. Helping was Harlen’s specialty. absurd sense of humour. In Dry Lips Humanity has long associated fire He was like a spider on a web. Oughta Move to Kapuskasing, Nana- with technological, intellectual, and Every so often, someone would bush toys with the Madonna/Whore spiritual illumination, as well as come along and tear off a piece complex, challenging popular no- with the homely comforts of food, of the web or poke a hole in it, tions of both. Nanabush uses the warmth, and security. Like Pro- and Harlen would come scut- feminine principle to instigate the metheus, Thomas is the bringer of tling along and throw out fila- men to action, appealing to them illumination; unlike Prometheus, ment after filament until the in a series of manifestations, at once Thomas’s light offers hope and life, damage was repaired. Berth both sacred and profane: a drunken, rather than corruption and death, … called it meddling. Harlen wounded Madonna; a stripper who to his people. Thomas is the sha- would have thought of it as doesn’t just dance on tables, but man, sending and receiving “smoke general maintenance. (King turns them on the men; and, a deco- signals” to and from the beyond, 31) rous Indian maid with a suggestively acting as a conduit between worlds: large bottom. Nanabush, inhabit- “We are all given one thing by which Harlen’s stories, which are only ing/animating the spirit of Black our lives are measured, one determi- loosely based on reality, represent a Lady Halked, Gazelle Nataways, nation. Mine are the stories which form of sympathetic magic, which and Patsy Pegahmagahbow, plays can change or not change the world. can be described as the practice of
VOLUME 26, NUMBERS 3,4 183 attracting desired outcomes by be- must restore “right relationships”; Victor a miniature drum, telling having as if they were already true they must live in harmony with him it’s her pager: “just give it a tap (another trickster trope). As Harlen the world, rather than in discord and I’ll be right over” (Alexie 23). begins to behave as though Will and to it. In particular, Aboriginal men Although Victor cannot bring him- Louise are dating, the next thing must (re)learn to walk in rhythm self to beat the drum, he admits, “I Will knows, they are dating. The with Aboriginal women. In many keep it really close to me, like Big rest of the community picks up Aboriginal cultures, the drum is Mom said, just in case. I guess you this campaign, and just assumes, de strongly associated with the femi- could call it the only religion I have, facto, [need “de facto” italicized?] nine principle; it signifies the womb one drum that can fit in my hand, that Will, Louise, and South Wing of our mothers, but also of our com- but I think if I played it a little, comprise a family unit. Similarly, mon mother, the earth. The drum it might fill up the whole world” when the nurses at the hospital as- (Alexie 23). sume that Will is “Mr. Heavyman,” The centrality of Aboriginal both Will and his friends go along women’s productive and reproduc- with the ruse. Warming to the idea A return to tive labour within their traditional of fatherhood, Will even names the traditions like societies is also well illustrated in Dry baby, and begins to think of her as Lips Oughta Move to Kapuskasing. his daughter: when asked to pick these allows Simon Starblanket, who is drawn to out which baby in the nursery is his, Aboriginal males to the tradition of his ancestors, has an he points to South Wing and says, epiphany as he chants and dances “that one” (King 42). (re)create positive the sacred rhythm in the bustle that Little does Will realize that he is and healthy visions Patsy’s step-mother made for him: resurrecting notions of marriage and of Aboriginal “[T]he drum has to come back. We kinship that belong(ed) to many have to learn to dance again … I’m Aboriginal societies (pre-contact manhood, and with the one who has to bring the drum and contemporary), in which babies them, Aboriginal back. And it’s Patsy’s medicine pow- often precede marriage, no child can er, that stuff she’s learning from her be considered “illegitimate”—not fatherhood. step-mother Rosie Kakapetum that in the western sense—and biologi- … helps me….” (Highway 43-45). cal paternity does not always define Simon goes on to proselytize to his “fatherhood” (see Anderson 2000; devoutly Christian friend: “Rosie Olsen 1995). It is this flexibility of makes manifest the sacred feminine, Kakapetum is gonna be my mother- family structure that has allowed Ab- representing women’s generative en- in-law in two months, Spooky Lac- original families to survive against ergy, as well as her innate pipeline roix, and if Patsy and I are gonna do incredible oppositional forces, and to the divine, as illustrated by one this thing right, if we’re gonna work will enable them to carry Aboriginal of Victor’s psychotropic revelations, together to make my best man, families into the future. in which he sees his grandmother, Dickie Bird Halked, well again, then A return to traditions like these Christ-like, walking on water (Alex- Rosie Kakapetum has got to birth to allows Aboriginal males to (re)create ie 22). Among many Aboriginal [Spooky’s] baby” (Highway 91). positive and healthy visions of Ab- peoples, the sound of the drum, or The venerated power of old wo- original manhood, and with them, that of any percussion instrument, men as carriers of culture, language, Aboriginal fatherhood. Although is said to echo the heartbeat that and traditional knowledge is em- the roles of Aboriginal fathers can- the fetus hears in utero, which in bodied in Medicine River’s “mar- not be reconstituted in the strictest turn recapitulates the rhythm of the riage doctor,” Martha Old Crow. pre-colonial sense, Aboriginal mas- earth: the never ending life-pulse She gives Will a rattle for South culine sensibilities can be redefined, that unites us all. Wing—unbeknownst to Will, she thus reincarnating the father in con- Rhythm is a motif that resounds has given Louise an identical one. temporary Aboriginal males. In the throughout the works, repeating The rattle is made of deer hide and works studied here, this transforma- womb-like imagery that evokes no- willow, materials that are used in tion is achieved through the practice tions of “the mother” with all of some Aboriginal cultures to con- of these three R’s of traditional In- her life-giving power and nurturing struct sweat lodges, which symbol- digeneity: rhythm, ritual, and rites qualities: “Big Mom was the spiritu- ize the womb of mother earth. To of passage. al leader of the Spokane Tribe. She use a broad understanding of the In these narratives it is intimated had so much good medicine I think term, people “sweat” in order to that for Aboriginal men to restore she may be the one who created the (among other things) re-join with Aboriginal masculinities, they earth” (Alexie 23). Big Mom gives mother earth to cleanse themselves
184 CANADIAN WOMAN STUDIES/LES CAHIERS DE LA FEMME (spiritually, emotionally, physically, Horse Capture, takes on great sig- warnings. But Norma was a mentally), emerging renewed, time nificance. Playing cowboy to Rose’s warrior. She was powerful. She and again. Reminiscent of the peace Indian, Will’s Euro-Canadian father could have picked up any two pipe, the physical construction of not only “captured her heart,” he of the boys and smashed their the rattle connotes the joining of also counted coup on her family by skulls together. But worse than the masculine and the feminine, stealing her away from her home, that, she would have dragged both in a metaphorical and literal as well as by stealing her Aboriginal them all over to some tipi and sense. The handle is phallic while right: “Sorry you had to leave the made them listen to some elder the shaker symbolizes the womb: reserve, but Calgary’s a better place tell a dusty old story. (Alexie in it are the seeds of potential. The for a swell girl like you. Stupid rule, 65) rattle represents both rhythm and anyway...” (King 4).6 ritual: rattles are often used in sha- Norma Many Horses is an exam- manic healing practices, along with ple of how many Aboriginal women chants and songs. have had to assume the role of the The rattle is also blue and yellow, Through symbolic father in his absence. Although her colours used throughout Medicine name speaks to her physical strength River to signify the feminine and death and and prowess, Norma’s solution is not the masculine. Rose’s memories of resurrection, to meet violence with violence, but Will’s father are swaddled in blue Aboriginal manhood to hold the boys accountable to an velvet and secured with a yellow older, higher power: the teachings ribbon. Along with the “un-love” is reincarnated of their elders. letters are a smattering of photo- in contemporary The need to return to the wisdom graphs: mainly of “men and women of the elders is exemplified in Will standing against prairie and sky” context with and Harlen’s journey to Martha Old (King 4), recording for posterity ancestral Crow’s home. For Will, this act is not only the relationship between memories of “right both transformative and definitive, the sexes, but also the yellow of signalling his re-birth as an Ab- mother earth’s prairie, and the blue relationship.” original male, and the resurrection of father sky. Through the ritual of of traditional ways. The river is the sympathetic magic, Louise and Will medicine. In its waters, both amni- use the twin rattles to sing their re- otic and purifying, Will is re-born lationship into being, chanting to Although horse theft is no lon- as a full member of the community, their own rhythm. The horsehair ger a capital offence and horses are a baptism necessary to restore “right adorning the rattle not only brings no longer used as a primary mode relationships” with his people; a to mind Will’s mother, echoing the of transportation, the horse-theft restoration that begins with Mar- romance between his parents: hair is motif has not disappeared from Ab- tha, a respected female elder, who also known to many cultures as an original fiction; it has only changed possesses the traditional knowledge ingredient in magic spells, especially its shape. Alexie’s character, Thomas Will needs to manifest his new love magic. Builds-the-Fire recounts a story life-role in corporeal form. Simi- The final stage in any transfor- about two contemporary youths larly, the traditionalist Simon Star- mation ritual is the rite of passage; who steal a car and leave it in front blanket must die so that the more another common motif in the three of the police station, making their “worldly” Zachary can be reborn in works. The stealing of horses was a parents proud. Viewed this way, Dry Lips Oughta Move to Kapuskas- rite of passage into manhood as well the theft is a misguided attempt to ing. Zachary’s spiritual infancy is as a badge of honour and prestige recreate the traditional “way of the signalled by his nudity for much of among North American Aboriginal warrior” in a new context that has the play. Bathed instead in the light horse cultures. The stealing or captur- rendered traditional notions of mas- of Grandmother Moon, with the ing of horses was a form of “counting culinity obsolete. feminine incarnation of Nanabush coup”: a non-violent way of demon- In “A Drug Called Tradition” it as both executioner and midwife, strating superior intelligence, stealth, is Norma Many Horses who saves Zachary experiences the shamanic cunning, and power over rivals or en- young Thomas from a potentially death (symbolized by the outdoor emies. Horses were so valued in these deadly beating by the boy, Victor: winter setting) of his former self, so cultures that they were often part of that the new man may emerge re- the gift made by the groom to the If it had been someone else, born. bride and her parents. even another man, the Indian Through symbolic death and In Medicine River, Rose’s surname, boys would’ve just ignored the resurrection, Aboriginal manhood
VOLUME 26, NUMBERS 3,4 185 is reincarnated in contemporary the top in—(what else) blue paper Allyson Anderson is a Cree-Métis so- context with ancestral memories of and yellow ribbon, indicating the cial activist and educator, and is a “right relationship”: “It is now…. reincarnation of the father in Ab- faculty member in the department of They are wearing only loincloths original family life. First Nations Studies at Vancouver Is- and braids. Although it is the twen- The final scene inDry Lips Ough- land University. She holds a Master’s tieth century and planes are pass- ta Move to Kapuskasing depicts the degree in Sociology from the Univer- ing overhead, [they] have decided reincarnation of the Aboriginal Fa- sity of British Columbia, and aside to be real Indians tonight” (Alexie ther in Zachary, who awakens from from Indigenous women’s studies, her 20). Victor believes that his hybrid his patri-colonial nightmare to find professional interests include global version of the Sioux Ghost Dance himself still naked, but safe and and media studies. Her personal in- will revive both ancestors and buf- sound in his family home. The last terests include horses, gardening, cook- falo. Thomas prophesies that, as we see of Zachary, he croons in Cree ing, and boating. the Phoenix rises from its ashes, so as he holds his nude baby daughter too will Victor’s father—in salmon in the air above him, his laughing 1This notion was derived from Ed- form—when Thomas throws them wife looking on beatifically. As the ward Said’s work, Orientalism. into the Spokane River. The salmon scene fades to black, the last thing 2For a comprehensive overview of and buffalo were, and still are, sa- we hear is Zachary’s wife, Hera, this process, see Anderson. cred to many Aboriginal societies, as whose “magical, silvery, Nanabush 3I chose to use the concept, “rein- well as a food staple; hunting and/or laugh” peals out; echoing and fading carnation,” to convey the cyclical fishing were principle activities for finally into a baby’s laugh (Highway nature of what I see as a spiritual men. The return of the sacred and 130). The mise-en-scène clearly her- journey for Aboriginal men, who traditional in current times suggests alds the return of Nanabush, and must reconstitute in some way those the return of useful social roles for with it, Zachary’s (re)awakening to fragments of traditional masculini- men. In order to begin a new life his identity as an Aboriginal male, ties that have survived generations cycle, Aboriginal men must learn to the restoration of his relationships of physical and cultural genocide. remember their ancestral pasts and with females, and his (re)clamation Reincarnation (in its varied inter- to envision their futures while they of his rightful role within his family pretations) occupies a place in the fulfill both in the present because, and community. cosmologies of some Aboriginal cul- “That’s what Indian time is. The The transformation is complete: tures, as well as in Hinduism, Bud- past, the future, all of it is wrapped through rhythm, ritual, and rites of dhism, and Taoism. Conversely, the up in the now. That’s how it is. We passage, Tonto has been resurrected concept of reincarnation is rejected are trapped in the now” (Alexie 22). as something new and qualitatively by mainstream monotheistic reli- Will’s return to Medicine River different. No longer is he a warrior gions (Islam, Judaism, and Christi- brings him full circle as well; it according to traditional Aboriginal anity) as contrary to the basic tenets reunites the ‘prodigal son’ with sensibilities, but no longer is he a eu- of their respective belief systems. In his home territory, and to father- nuch, either. He’s been reincarnated this sense, I use the term, “reincar- hood, the final rite of passage into in the sons, who negotiate a com- nation,” as a discourse of resistance manhood. Long ago, Will’s father plex and complicated relationship that embodies ancient and enduring promised the boys a musical top. between the teachings of their an- non-western notions of time and Although the apocryphal gift never cestors, the demands of modernity, spirit. does reach Will and James, having and the legacy of colonization. In all 4The fusion of Aboriginal and been “lost in the mail,” the top does of this, these fictive Aboriginal sons Christian rhetorical tropes used in eventually find its way home—just must also reject colonial definitions this paper reflects Aboriginal peo- in a different form, in a different of Aboriginal masculinities, restore ples’ syncretic response to religious time. The top Will gives to South their relationships with women and imperialism, both in real life and as Wing “made a sweet, humming mother earth, and (re)claim their a product of literary imagination. sound, the pitch changing as it spun roles within the family unit, thereby All of the chosen works take place in its perfect circle: red, yellow, blue, (re)defining Aboriginal manhood within the social, cultural, and spiri- green” (King 261). The top repre- not just for themselves, but for sub- tual nexus between Christianity and sents the medicine wheel, an epis- sequent generations as well. For Ab- traditional Aboriginal belief sys- temological paradigm emphasizing original men, it seems, “the way of tems, with all three authors explor- cyclical motion and balance. The the warrior” hasn’t gotten any easier; ing the ambiguous spaces where the colours on the top suggest the four it’s just taken a different direction. two intersect. directions as well as the masculine For Aboriginal women, it means 5For an illustration of this process as and feminine, spinning in perfect that our men are a few steps closer it occurred in British Columbia, see balance and harmony. Will wraps on their journey home. Knight.
186 CANADIAN WOMAN STUDIES/LES CAHIERS DE LA FEMME 6This quote refers to section 12(1)(b) Labour In British Columbia, Olsen, Sylvia. Just Ask Us: A of the Indian Act, which, previous 1858–1930. Vancouver: Newstar, Conversation With First Nations to 1985, decreed that status Indian 1996. Teenage Moms. Winlaw, British women automatically lost that sta- Krug, Etienne G., Linda L. Dahlberg, Columbia: Sono Nis Press, 1995. tus upon marriage to a non-Indian James A. Mercy, Anthony B. Zwi Rhoades, “The Health Status of male, and must move from the re- and Rafael Lozano, eds. “Chapter American Indian And Alaska serve, and may not return, even if 7: Self-Directed Violence.” Native Males.” The American widowed or divorced. Furthermore, World Report On Violence And Journal of Public Health 93 (5) her children and all of their sub- Health. Geneva: World Health (May 2003): 774-778. sequent progeny lost the right to Organization. 2002. Online: World Health Organization claim Indian status in perpetuity.
VOLUME 26, NUMBERS 3,4 187 Second Waves Archives Project Nancy’s Very Own Foundation
Where are the stories, minutes, photos, briefs and buttons that tell the story of the women’s movement in Canada since 1960?
Few such records are on deposit in public archives. This project aims to direct valuable materi- als into repositories where future researchers can find them, helping them to create an accurate and complete portrayal of this important period in Canada’s history.
The project has four main objectives:
1. To locate second wave records and find them a home in a suitable public archives; 2. To collect stories that are not on paper, through a pilot oral history project, starting in Ontario; 3. To share information about second wave history with feminist activists, academics, ar- chivists and researchers; 4. To create an online resource that makes it easier to donate second wave records to an archives, and to locate and access these archival collections.
We are looking for archival materials from individual feminists and from organizations that worked for women’s equality. We want them to reflect the character of the movement — in all its diversity, drama, distinctiveness, influence and consequences.
If we don’t tell our own stories of the last 50 years, either others will interpret them for us, or they won’t get told at all.
Do you have records related to second wave feminism in Canada? Have you already sent documents to an archives? Do you know any second wavers who might be holding onto archival treasures?
Please contact Project Coordinator: Mary Breen 416-604-4620 [email protected]
She can:
1. Put you in touch with institutions and/or archives associations that can advise you on the right repository for your materials; 2. Provide you with further information regarding the accession process; 3. Share information about second wave materials already on deposit at archives across Canada; 4. Take your suggestions about other women and organizations to contact; 5. Connect you with itinerant archivists or students who can help prepare your records for deposit.
188 CANADIAN WOMAN STUDIES/LES CAHIERS DE LA FEMME