The Pennsylvania State University The Graduate School College of the Liberal Arts FROM MISREPRESENTATION TO MISAPPREHENSION: DISCURSIVE RESISTANCE AND THE POLITICS OF DISPLACEMENT IN NATIVE AMERICA A Thesis in Comparative Literature by Quentin E. Youngberg © 2006 Quentin E. Youngberg Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy December 2006 The thesis of Quentin E. Youngberg was reviewed and approved* by the following: Djelal Kadir Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Comparative Literature Thesis Advisor Chair of Committee Sophia A. McClennen Associate Professor of Comparative Literature, Spanish, and Women’s Studies Aldon L. Nielsen Kelly Professor of American Literature Matthew B. Restall Professor of Latin American History, Anthropology, and Women’s Studies, Director of Graduate Studies in History, and Director of Latin American Studies Caroline D. Eckhardt Professor of English and Comparative Literature Head of the Department of Comparative Literature * Signatures are on file in the Graduate School. iii ABSTRACT The very real social and political problems on reservations (like poverty, alcoholism, and suicide) will never be solved so long as these issues are elided by essentialist discussions of culture. Romanticized conceptions of Native cultures elide the facts of racism, bureaucratic inefficiency, and purposefully systematized erosions of Native sovereignty. In the process of these elisions, blame for social problems is laid on the culturally “atavistic” and “inept” (savage) victims for problems that stem, in reality, from an ongoing colonial relationship. By taking on various popular myths about Native cultures (the myth of the Vanishing Indian, the idea of the Nature-Indian, or the myth of the White-Indian), and by setting Native voices in opposition to those myths, this dissertation attempts to de- mystify the politics that lie behind public discourses on and by Native peoples. Moreover, it seeks a better understanding of the ways Natives are denied political agency through public discourses that attempt to represent indians in romanticized, overtly cultural, and ultimately apolitical terms. This is not a project of “understanding” Native cultures; rather, it is a project of understanding how Native cultures are constituted, and why they are constituted as such, in the mythological discourses of a national public. Furthermore, it serves to recognize how those same cultures are reconstituted through the critical responses of Native voices to those national mythologies. Here, I begin to unravel the relationship between culture and politics and, more importantly, to uncover some of the more popular cultural assumptions still working today to displace Natives themselves and to undermine Native politics. My point is that cultural essentialisms come to stand in for political realities; and it is imperative that we iv come to understand the political basis of Native misrepresentations and misapprehensions. It is also imperative that we give due attention to those Native literatures that insinuate themselves into the contest of representational politics that inform public policies. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction. FROM MISREPRESENTATION TO MISAPPREHENSION . 1 Chapter 1. NATURALIZING THE INDIAN: DEPOLITICIZED NATURES AND EMERGENT RESISTANCE IN NATIVE AMERICAN LITERATURE . 12 Chapter 2. VANISHING THE INDIAN: THE DISCURSIVE POLITICS OF A DISAPPEARING ACT. 77 Chapter 3. RE-REPRESENTING THE INDIAN IN FILM: “THE KIND OF INDIAN THEY ARE”. 148 Smoking Out the Truth: Alexie’s Indians and Modern Film. .151 Interpenetrating Codes and the “Truth” About Spirits. 163 Chapter 4. NON-NATIVE REPRESENTATIONS OF INDIANS: WHITES ON NATIVE GROUNDS. .191 Indian Wannabes and “Other” Displacements . 192 Anthropologists and “Other” Academics . 211 Conclusion. CULTURAL CAUSES AND POLITICAL PROBLEMS . 234 Works Cited . 240 vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would first like to thank those many Native writers who appear in this text, and others who do not, for providing me with material enough to pursue an area of study that I love. This project is not made possible by my voice; rather, its conception depended wholly on the presence of many Native voices brave and eloquent enough to stand and speak. I am also grateful to the Institute for the Arts and Humanities at the Pennsylvania State University for awarding me their dissertation fellowship in the spring of 2006. Their support provided me with the opportunity to dedicate time solely to my dissertation as well as the chance to be in the company of some truly talented scholars at the University. “Interpenetrating Codes and the ‘Truth’ About Spirits,” which forms the second half of chapter three will appear in different form in Studies in American Indian Literatures in the spring of 2008. I am grateful to Daniel Heath Justice, editor at SAIL, and to his anonymous readers for their incisive commentaries and constructive criticisms. I would also be remiss if I failed to acknowledge the contribution of Professor Carey Eckhardt whose keen eye for detail was indispensable to the task of ironing out the many orthographical, grammatical, and citational inconsistencies in my original text. In addition to being a capable, caring, and supportive department head, her skills as an editor are second to none. The office staff in the Department of Comparative Literature were also an integral part of this project. I would like to thank Irene Grassi for being the masterful organizer she is and for her patient skill at knowing how to get things done. To Lynn Setzler, for vii always knowing . everything. I can’t count the number of times I would have been completely lost as a graduate student without their intimate knowledge of how this department works. Cindy, JoElle, Wendy, Mona, Bonnie, and Julie not only provided me with essential help when I needed it, but also kind words when I needed them. I am grateful for all their support. I have also received much in the way of moral support from the many friends I have made in the Department of Comparative Literature. To those other graduate students who have been wishing me well all along, I offer my sincerest gratitude. In particular, I would like to acknowledge the friendship of Barbara Alfano who, in the many years I have studied at the university, has proven her worth as a colleague, friend, and confidant. I am also deeply appreciative of my dissertation committee. I have been fortunate enough to be able to work under the tutelage of several very talented professionals. Professors Sophia McClennen, Aldon Nielsen, and Matthew Restall each provided me with incisive criticisms and valuable insights into the work I am doing. I owe a debt of gratitude to each of them for their time and attention. Professor Djelal Kadir, my committee chair and thesis advisor, deserves special mention here. His constant generosity to all of his students, and his selfless dedication to the practices and institutions of academic inquiry, have been inspirational. He has been an attentive advisor, a constant supporter, and a generous and responsive mentor to me. He is a brilliant scholar whose input has never failed to make my own work better. I could never hope to repay the debt I owe him for that kindness; nor could I ever hope to live up to his intellectual and professional example. viii Finally, I want to acknowledge the influence of my family. Ultimately, I could never have hoped to finish this dissertation without the support of my wife, Larissa, and my daughter, Casey. Not to mention Larissa’s patience in working to support me for so long while I dragged in a graduate student’s stipend, they have served as welcome distractions from my work as well as pointed reminders when I needed to get back to work. Larissa has always believed in me, even when I did not believe in myself. That sort of dedication can never be repaid. For her love and support, I owe her everything. 1 Introduction FROM MISREPRESENTATION TO MISAPPREHENSION In the summer of 2005, in a course titled Introduction to the Literatures of the Americas, I had the opportunity to teach Gerald Vizenor’s1 Manifest Manners: Postindian Warriors of Survivance to a classroom full of freshmen. My expectation was that the text would be mostly inaccessible to such a young audience and that, inexperienced as they were with the cultural theory Vizenor’s work is so heavily invested in, we would spend a good deal of time just teasing out what the text was saying. For the most part my prediction was on the mark; but I was pleasantly surprised at the interest that the text generated among my students in spite of its difficulty for them. In fact, nearly 90 percent of the students opted to write their unit responses on Vizenor’s book that week. What struck them the most, it seemed, was that they themselves could be, and had been, duped by the ministrations of manifest manners. In terms of their knowledge about other cultures, and especially about Native American cultures, they had been misled by “the course of dominance, the racialist notions and misnomers sustained in archives and lexicons as ‘authentic’ representations of indian cultures” (Vizenor i). In short, they were disappointed at how little they knew, how inaccurate a picture was comprised by what they did know, even more so at the idea that they could be fooled in such a way, and that they were complicit themselves in sustaining these racialist notions. Such epiphanies among a teacher’s wards are very satisfying professionally; but, in this case, their sudden illumination also opened up another problem. For all their interest in teasing out the stereotypes that they had been inculcated with since childhood, it became clear to me that speaking of stereotypes alone was insufficient. We simply 2 couldn’t come to terms with the politics involved in such misapprehensions by chalking them up to stereotypes and moving on.