+ROO\ZRRG V,QGLDQ 3HWHU5ROOLQV 3XEOLVKHGE\7KH8QLYHUVLW\3UHVVRI.HQWXFN\ 5ROOLQV3 +ROO\ZRRG V,QGLDQ7KH3RUWUD\DORIWKH1DWLYH$PHULFDQLQ)LOP /H[LQJWRQ7KH8QLYHUVLW\3UHVVRI.HQWXFN\ 3URMHFW086( :HE$XJ KWWSVPXVHMKXHGX )RUDGGLWLRQDOLQIRUPDWLRQDERXWWKLVERRN KWWSVPXVHMKXHGXERRN Access provided by University of California @ Berkeley (29 Aug 2016 17:41 GMT) {( 12 / PAULINE TURNER STRONG Playing Indian in the Nineties Pocahontas and The Indian in the Cupboard Hollywood has long taken a leading role in shaping the American tradi­ tion of "playing Indian." This chapter considers how this tradition is mo­ bilized in two family films released in 1995: Disney's heavily marketed Pocahontas and the Columbia/Paramount adaptation of Lynne Reid Banks's popular children's novel The Indian in the Cupboard. Borrowing a concept from Donna Haraway, I would place my "situated knowledge" of these films and their associated playthings at the intersection of, first, my scholarly interest in the production and significance of imagined In­ dians in Anglo-American culture; second, my memories of "playing In­ dian" at school, at summer camp, and in Camp Fire Girls during my childhood; and, finally, my experiences rearing two daughters (ages seven and ten when the films were released). In other words, this is what Kathleen Stewart would call a "contaminated" critique, one that is com­ plexly influenced by my participation in the cultural phenomena that it analyzes. I write as a pianist who has played "Colors Of The Wind" (the theme song from Pocahontas) so often for my daughters' school choir that it runs unbidden through my mind; as a parent who has spent much of a weekend "playing Indian" on CD-ROM, helping seven-year-old Tina "earn symbols" for a computer-generated wampum belt so that we could be inducted as "Friends of the Iroquois"; and, above all, as a cultural critic whose views are influenced both by the insights of my daughters and by my hopes for their generation. As I sit at my computer composing this essay, a three-inch plastic Indian stands beside the monitor. He wears a scalp lock, yellow leggings and breechcloth, a yellow knife sheath, and a yellow pouch. Next to him is the case for our videocassette of The Indian in the Cupboard, with the cover reversed, as directed, so that the case simulates a weathered wooden 188/ Pauline Turner Strong Figure 12.1. Video, CD-ROM, and plastic versions ofThe Indian ill the C1lpboard. The cupboard is made by reversing the cover of the video case. The other side pictures Omri holding the miniature Indian and announces "FREE! Indian, Cupboard and Key Included!" Photo © 1997 by Suzanne McEndree. Playing Indian in the 1990s /189 cabinet. Beside the cabinet is a plastic skeleton key, almost as large as the miniature Indian, that can be used to open the cabinet. Although it is possible to purchase the Indian figurine and the key independently, as well as figurines of other characters in the film, ours were packaged with the video, just as a locket was packaged with The Little Princess. Equipped with the miniature Indian, the cabinet, and the key, I can, if I wish, imitate Omri, the nine-year-old American boy whose coming­ of-age story is told in the film. Omri, like his English namesake in the novel, is given an Indian figurine that comes to life when locked inside a magical cabinet. My figurine does not come to life, but it nevertheless mocks me as it stands by my computer, underscoring my embeddedness in several traditions-European and Anglo-American, popular and schol­ arly-that have locked miniature Indians in cabinets, be they late-Re­ naissance wonder cabinets, children's toy collections, tourists' and collectors' displays, or museum dioramas. If I wish to simulate Omri's mastery over life I must turn to the CD­ ROM version of The Indian in the Cupboard, where with my cursor I can animate an Indian figurine-one that, like the miniatures that open the film, appears to be "antique," made of painted porcelain or wood rather than plastic. The figurine reminds me of a miniature cigar-store Indian or a ship'S figurehead, as do the seven other Indian figurines on Omri's toy shelf. When I move the cursor in order to place the figurine in the cabi­ net and turn the key, it "comes to life" and begins to talk to me. Like Omri's miniature friend in the film, this animated Indian is named Little Bear. He identifies himself as an Onondaga of the Wolf clan and intro­ duces me to his U ngachis, his "friends" on the toy shelf. He gives me the name of Henuyeha, or "player."l I accompany Little Bear to a promon­ tory overlooking his palisaded village, where his people live in three longhouses. Descending to the village I meet the Ungachis, whom I will later bring to life as my guides. I recall the many American Indians who have made their living as guides for hunters or anthropologists, as well as the YMCA organization Indian Guides, to which my brother and father once belonged (an organization parodied to good effect in the Disney film Man of the House). Foremost among my Onondaga "friends" is a clan mother, Gentle Breeze, who will introduce me to Onondaga words, stories, and symbols referring to the ancestors of the clans-Turtle, Bear, Wolf, Snipe, Beaver, Hawk, Deer, and Eel-as well as to the underwater Panther, the Keeper of the Winds and his Spirit Animals, the Peacemaker, and the Tree of Peace. Another Ungachi, a "chief' named He Knows the Sky, will point out and tell me stories about Grandmother Moon, the Path of the 190/ Pauline Turner Strong Figure 12.2. The miniature Indians pictured during the credits to The Illdian in the Cupboard and in the cupboard in the CD-ROM video game are reminiscent of nineteenth­ centmy "cigar store Indians:' The Iife­ size wooden figure depicted here, dating from about 186.5, stood in the streets of Cleveland, Ohio. It was painted about 1937 by Eugene Croe as part of a WPA folk art project. Ciga r Sture Indiall, Index of American Design, © Board of Trustees, National Gallery of Art, Washington. Dead, the Bear, the Seven Children, and Star Girl. ("What I like about the Onondaga," says ten-year-old Katie upon hearing the story of how Star Girl guided the starving people home, "is that it's not only boys and men who do important things.") An Ungachi named Shares the Songs will teach me to play water drums, a flute, and a variety of rattles, challenging me to remember ever more complex rhythms. Swift Hunter will teach me to recognize and fol­ low animal tracks, while Keeper of the \iVords will show me how to make a headdress in the style of each of the Six Nations of the League of the Onondaga. Two children will teach me their games: from Blooming Flower I will learn how to decorate carved templates with beads; from Runs \\lith the 'Vind, how to playa challenging memory game with seeds of corn, squash, and several varieties of beans. Succeeding in these various activities requires patience, attentive­ ness, and a well-developed memory. Each time I succeed I am rewarded with a symbol for my "wampum belt" and the kind of effusive praise Anglo- Playing Indian in the 1990s /191 American children expect. Upon its completion a ceremony is held to present me with the wampum belt and to name me an Ungachi, a "Friend of the Iroquois." I am feasted with a meal of com, pumpkin, potatoes, squash, deer, roasted turkey, and cornbread. This concludes the ceremony, which I have experienced as a disconcerting example of what Michael Taussig calls "mimetic excess." The resonances are many and diverse: Camp Fire Girl "council fires" at which, proudly wearing my deerskin "ceremonial gown" and the beads I had "earned," I paid homage to Wohelo ('Work, Health, Love"); campfires under the stars at Camp Wilaha and Camp Kotami; classroom lessons and plays about the first Thanksgiving; the councils of "The Grand Order of the Iroquois," a fraternal organiza­ tion founded by anthropologist Louis Henry Morgan (Bieder); the assimilationist group of reformers known as the "Friends of the Indian" (Prucha); and Vine Deloria's caustic dismissal of "anthropologists and other friends" in Custer Died for Your Sins. Despite my initial discomfort with the power of bringing miniature Onondagas to life-and especially with the power to tum them back into mute "plastic"-I find myself intrigued and charmed by this simulated world. So is Tina, whose favorite game is one in which we bring an En­ glish trader to life and barter with him for trade goods. In the process we learn a fair amount about Iroquois hunting, farming, manufactures, and desires for trade goods. (The other Anglo-American figurine-and the only character drawn from the film besides Little Bear-is the cowardly cowboy Boone, with whom we experience the terrors of Omri's room from the perspective of a person three inches in height.) By the time Tina and I are presented with our wampum belts, we have been introduced to many aspects of Onondaga life in the early eighteenth century: the forest, the river, and the clearing; the architecture and layout of the village; com, beans, and squash, the Three Sisters; the powers of various animals; the Onondaga names and legends of the moon, Milky Way, and several con­ stellations; the manufacture of goods and the practice of reciprocity; the importance of clans and clan matrons. We have heard many Onondaga words and learned to recognize a few.