Native? Or, not? -- A Resource List

Dear AICL Reader,

Some of you are aware of the ongoing conversations about claims to being Native. A high profile case right now is Michelle Latimer, who said she was Native. People believed her. But then it turned out the people she claimed did not and do not, know her. 

Starting with this post on Feb 24, 2021, I am building a resource list of articles, books, and podcasts that I think others should be aware of--especially if you are editing, reviewing, or teaching material that is presented as being created by someone who says they are Native. The items are presented chronologically because some refer to previous ones. For many of you, this conversation is new. To Native people, it is not. You'll see several phrases used--like "playing Indian" and "pretendian" and you'll see that I include items about DNA testing.  

If you know of a resource I could add, please let me know by email or by using the comment form, below. And please share this page with your family, friends, and colleagues. 

Thanks,

Debbie

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Playing Indian by Philip J. Deloria, published in 1999 by Yale University Press. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

The Boston Tea Party, the Order of Red Men, Camp Fire Girls, Boy Scouts, Grateful Dead concerts are just a few examples of the American tendency to appropriate Indian dress and act out Indian roles. This provocative book explores how white Americans have used their ideas about Indians to shape national identity in different eras—and how Indian people have reacted to these imitations of their native dress, language, and ritual.

At the Boston Tea Party, colonial rebels played Indian in order to claim an aboriginal American identity. In the nineteenth century, Indian fraternal orders allowed men to rethink the idea of revolution, consolidate national power, and write nationalist literary epics. By the twentieth century, playing Indian helped nervous city dwellers deal with modernist concerns about nature, authenticity, Cold War anxiety, and various forms of relativism. Deloria points out, however, that throughout American history the creative uses of Indianness have been interwoven with conquest and dispossession of the Indians. Indian play has thus been fraught with ambivalence—for white Americans who idealized and villainized the Indian, and for Indians who were both humiliated and empowered by these cultural exercises.

Deloria suggests that imagining Indians has helped generations of white Americans define, mask, and evade paradoxes stemming from simultaneous construction and destruction of these native peoples. In the process, Americans have created powerful identities that have never been fully secure.

Becoming Indian: The Struggle over Cherokee Identity in the Twenty-first Century by Circe Sturm, published in 2011 by the School for Advanced Research Press. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

In Becoming Indian, author Circe Sturm examines Cherokee identity politics and the phenomenon of racial shifting. Racial shifters, as described by Sturm, are people who have changed their racial self-identification from non-Indian to Indian on the US Census. Many racial shifters are people who, while looking for their roots, have recently discovered their Native American ancestry. Others have family stories of an Indian great-great-grandmother or -grandfather they have not been able to document. Still others have long known they were of Native American descent, including their tribal affiliation, but only recently have become interested in reclaiming this aspect of their family history. Despite their differences, racial shifters share a conviction that they have Indian blood when asserting claims of indigeneity. Becoming Indian explores the social and cultural values that lie behind this phenomenon and delves into the motivations of these Americans—from so many different walks of life—to reinscribe their autobiographies and find deep personal and collective meaning in reclaiming their Indianness. Sturm points out that “becoming Indian” was not something people were quite as willing to do forty years ago—the willingness to do so now reveals much about the shifting politics of race and indigeneity in the United States.

Native American DNA: Tribal Belonging and the False Promise of Genetic Science by Kim TallBear, published in 2013 by University of Minnesota Press. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

Because today’s DNA testing seems so compelling and powerful, increasing numbers of Native Americans have begun to believe their own metaphors: “in our blood” is giving way to “in our DNA.” In Native American DNA, Kim TallBear shows how Native American claims to land, resources, and sovereignty that have taken generations to ratify may be seriously—and permanently—undermined.

 

'There is no DNA test to prove you're Native American' by Linda Geddes, is an interview with Kim TallBear in New Scientist on Feb 4, 2014. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

Joseph Boyden exploits mythical Native identity by Doug George-Kanentiio at Indianz is an Opinion piece subtitled "Joseph Boyden: An Imposter Under Native Law" on Jan 6, 2017. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

Exposing false Native heritage at Native America Calling on Feb 10, 2021. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

After a CBC investigation called her claimed Indigenous heritage into question, Canadian filmmaker Michelle Latimer resigned as director of the CBC-TV series “Trickster,” a show she co-created. The National Film Board also dropped its intention to distribute her film “Inconvenient Indian” and pulled it from a Sundance Film Festival screening. It’s the latest in a continuing series of prominent people who initially benefitted from their Indigenous identity but were forced to backtrack when those claims couldn’t be documented. We’ll hear about the latest incident and an effort to expose those who improperly cash in on Native heritage. 

 

Distorted Descent: White Claims to Indigenous Identity by Darryl Leroux, published in 2019 by University of Manitoba Press. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

Distorted Descent examines a social phenomenon that has taken off in the twenty-first century: otherwise white, French descendant settlers in Canada shifting into a self-defined “Indigenous” identity. This study is not about individuals who have been dispossessed by colonial policies, or the multi-generational efforts to reconnect that occur in response. Rather, it is about white, French-descendant people discovering an Indigenous ancestor born 300 to 375 years ago through genealogy and using that ancestor as the sole basis for an eventual shift into an “Indigenous” identity today.

After setting out the most common genealogical practices that facilitate race shifting, Leroux examines two of the most prominent self-identified “Indigenous” organizations currently operating in Quebec. Both organizations have their origins in committed opposition to Indigenous land and territorial negotiations, and both encourage the use of suspect genealogical practices. Distorted Descent brings to light to how these claims to an “Indigenous” identity are then used politically to oppose actual, living Indigenous peoples, exposing along the way the shifting politics of whiteness, white settler colonialism, and white supremacy.  

For more information on the rise of the so-called ‘Eastern Metis’ in the eastern provinces and in New England, including a storymap, court documents, and research materials, visit the Raceshifting website, created by Unwritten Histories Digital Consulting.

How 'pretendians' undermine the rights of Indigenous people by Rebecca Nagle, published on April 2, 2019 at High Country News. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

Fraud in Native American Communities, a Special Issue of American Indian Culture and Research Journal, in honor of Suzan Shown Harjo. Edited by Nancy Marie Mithlo, Volume 43, Issue 4, 2019. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

• Fauxskins, by Heid E. Erdrich
• At the Center of the Controversy: Confronting Ethnic Fraud in the Arts, by Ashley Holland
• Decentering Durham, by Nancy Marie Mithlo
• Not Jimmie Durham's Cherokee, by Roy Boney, Jr.
• Walk-Through at the Hammer, by James Lunda
• A Chapter Closed? by America Meredith
• What Shall We Do with the Bodies? Reconsidering the Archive in the Aftermath of Fraud, by Mario A. Caro.
• Living in a (Shrodinger's) Box: Jimmie Durham's Strategic Use of Ambiguity, by Suzanne Newman Fricke
• The Artist Knows Best: The De-Professionalism of a Profession, by Nancy Marie Mithlo
• Hustling and Hoaxing: Institutions, Modern Styles, and Yeffe Kimball's "Native" Art, by Sarah Anne Stolte
• Aspirational Descent and the Creation of Family Lore: Race Shifting in the Northeast, by Darryl Leroux
• Closing the Gap: Ethics and the Law in the Exhibition of Contemporary Native Art, by Tahnee M. Ahtoneharjo-Growingthunder
• Claims to Native Identity in Children's Literature, by Debbie Reese
• Playing Indian, between Idealization and Vilification: Seems You have to Play Indian to be Indian, by Rosy Simas and Sam Aros Mitchell

On colonization, racial supremacy and playing Indian: A response to 'Statement of Global Indigenous Identity and Solidarity' by Rhiana Yazzie at Indianz on Oct 14, 2021.

The Pretendian Problem at Indian Country Today's newscast on Jan 28, 2021. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

First Nation filmmakers are now pushing for new legislation in Canada to penalize people who pretend to be Indigenous in order to access grants, awards and jobs intended for Indigenous people. There’s a long history of non-Natives assuming a tribal identity...everything from using red face in a Hollywood film, to the antics of the Boston Tea Party. Jeff Bear is a seasoned journalist who makes documentary films. He’s Maliseet and one of his most recent films is, “Samaqan: Water Stories.” It’s about the power of rivers. He also has produced a new series "Petroglyphs to Pixels." Jeff Bear joins us today to discuss Indian Country's pretend Indian problem.

 

A growing number of "Pretendian" artists and the potential repercussions at APTN's "InFocus" on Jan 28, 2021. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

It's a bizarre phenomenon - people pretending to be Indigenous to get jobs or grants or even just attention, because it's cool to be us.

What's not funny is they are taking highly lucrative work from Indigenous people. They're teaching our histories. They're telling our stories.

On this episode, we are putting Indigenous identity fraud InFocus.

The Convenient "Pretendian" at Canadaland on Feb 14, 2021. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

Latimer’s documentary Inconvenient Indian premiered at TIFF and reaped plaudits and awards. It’s now been pulled from distribution. Her series Trickster, based on a novel by Eden Robinson, debuted on the CBC and was slated for a second season. It’s been cancelled. Why does the Canadian cultural establishment make darlings of figures like Latimer? Ryan McMahon joins Jesse to discuss. Then documentary filmmaker Alethea Arnaquq-Baril, who is featured in Inconvenient Indian, considers the ethics and responsibility of storytelling, and why this controversy has been hurtful to so many Indigenous people. And Steven Lonsdale, whose seal hunt Latimer filmed for Inconvenient Indian, explains what he’d like to see done with that footage.

Contemplating the Consequences of Colonial Cosplay at Media Indigena on Feb 24, 2021. [Added on Feb 24 2021]

With issues of identity reaching a fever pitch of late, we thought we’d take its temperature. From Michelle Latimer’s contested claims to Indigeneity, to an ever-growing, quasi-underground list of Alleged Pretendians, not to mention a Twitter tempest over light-skin privilege, we’ll break down what’s at play, what’s at stake and—in part two—what might be ways out of this messy business.

Joining host/producer Rick Harp at the roundtable are Kim TallBear, associate professor in the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Peoples, Technoscience & Environment, as well as Candis Callison, Associate Professor in the Institute for Critical Indigenous Studies and the Graduate School of Journalism at UBC.

Creating Culpability for Colonial Cosplay: Punishment for Pretendians at Media Indigena on Feb 27, 2021. [Added on Mar 1 2021]

Punishment for Pretendians: the back half of our extended look at colonial cosplay. And if part one was all about the problem, this part’s all about solutions. Just what is to be done about all these faux First Nations actors, authors and academics? What mechanisms might we use, and by whose authority? Does it make sense to target all the players, or would it be better to re-write the rules of the game?

Back with host/producer Rick Harp to assess what's been put forth as ways to sift through the grift are Candis Callison, Associate Professor in the Institute for Critical Indigenous Studies and the Graduate School of Journalism at UBC, and Kim TallBear, associate professor in the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta as well as Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Peoples, Technoscience & Environment.

Beverly Slapin's review of JUAN PABLO AND THE BUTTERFLIES

Back in June, a reader wrote to ask me about Juan Pablo and the Butterflies by J. J. Flowers. I did a "have you seen" post about it and am glad to see that Beverly Slapin, of De Colores: The Raza Experience in Books for Children, has a review up now. Here's some excerpts:

Abuela appears to be a shaman as well. She’s an all-in-one spiritual phenom, singularly embodying not only a whole culture’s metaphysics but also bits of other cultures—a mishmash of mythology and mysticism that the author invents. 

Still, it was the old woman’s shamanic powers that were a good deal more popular than her famous doctoring skill. Nothing made his abuela happier than taking away people’s aches and pains, their troubles and struggles. She took away the pain of childbirth as well as the opposite, the struggle of transitioning. She cured little Jose’s [sic / the nickname for “José” would be “Pepe,” not “little José”] poor hearing, but also his mother’s gambling problem, Ms. Sanchez’s strange rash, but also her husband’s infidelity, Mr. Hernandez’s high blood pressure, but also his depression. Occasionally she worked miracles, curing dementia, diabetes, and even many different cancers. People sought her out from hundreds of miles away. (p. 11)

And there's a subsection about playing Indian:

NOTE ABOUT “PLAYING INDIAN”

When Juan Pablo and Rocio were children: 

Following his abuela’s suggestion, he and Rocio had built an Indian tepee [sic] in the forest just beyond the meadow. No one else but his abuela knew about it. The tepee [sic] became their secret, a private tent where they passed the endless hours of childhood playing imaginary games: Indians—Rocio was the chief and he was the brave; hospital—Rocio was the doctor and he the patient; school—Rocio was the teacher and he the student; and the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry—finally, he was Harry Potter and Rocio was Hermione. But lately, as they began outgrowing imaginary games, they hiked up to the tepee [sic] just to read good books like The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Old Man and the Sea, but also The Fault in Our Stars and The Hunger Games. (p.21)

Since most Mexicans are of Mestizo heritage, they’re “Indians.” That Juan Pablo’s Indian abuela would encourage the Indian children to “play Indian” doesn’t make any internal cultural sense. And, as Indian children, why would they want to enact stereotypical Plains Indians? This is all the author’s cultural assumptions and does not apply to Mexican children who probably did not grow up watching “cowboys and Indians” on 1950s TV shoot-‘em-ups. (JP and Rocio’s “tepee” shows up in a later chapter, when Juan Pablo and Rocio are on the run and hide in this “wooden structure,” which a tipi is not.)

The author also inserts some miscellaneous stuff that misrepresents Indians and Mestizos:

If [JP] squinted against the light just so, he could see the narrowest of paths reaching around the cliff. Probably an old Indian path. Indians used to live here hundreds of years ago, after the Aztecs and before the Spaniards. (p. 81)

Go read the full review! There's a lot of detail there that you'll find helpful. 

POPCORN by Frank Asch

Eds. Note on July 31, 2017: This racist book is now available as a board book for the youngest readers. Racism sells. 

Eds. Note on March 11, 2023: There is a new edition coming out in summer of 2023 that replaces the Indian costume with a pirate one. Some info here: https://americanindiansinchildrensliterature.blogspot.com/2023/03/another-new-cover-for-frank-aschs.html 

Dear Editors at Aladdin/Simon & Schuster,

A reader of AICL wrote to ask me about Frank Asch's Popcorn. It is an older book (pub year 1979, from Parents Magazine Press) that I haven't written about before. As a former elementary school teacher, I do remember one of the books about Sam (the bear). Not this one, though. Perhaps I saw it and decided not to use it. With good reason. In it, Sam (the bear) is having a Halloween party. Here he is in his costume:

Source: http://i.ytimg.com/vi/_RDXFS33SaM/maxresdefault.jpg

Here's the old cover:

Source: https://c2.staticflickr.com/6/5474/10652326993_4d45e9c8a1_b.jpg

And, here's the new one, published in 2015 by Aladdin/Simon and Schuster. The synopsis at Amazon tells us "This refreshed edition of a beloved classic features the original text and art with an updated cover." 

It must have made a fair bit of money for you, Aladdin, to be giving it to us again in 2015, with this "updated" cover---but it has racist material! Do you not follow any of the national conversations around stereotyping of Native people? Or, about mascots?

Giving children this book, in 2015, suggests that either you're ignorant of those conversations and the research studies about the harm of such imagery, or, you know about it and don't care.

It is definitely a Book to Avoid. And, it is definitely another book for AICL's "Foul Among the Good" page.

Any chance you can 'stop the presses' so to speak? Or maybe recall what you've already sent out?

Sincerely,
Debbie Reese
American Indians in Children's Literature

Vanity Fair's "Favorite" Halloween Costumes

Having my coffee this morning, my twitter feed included a link to a Vanity Fair slideshow of "favorite" costumes at an event that took place last night (Halloween). I wondered if Hamish Robertson (the photographer) and editors at Vanity Fair were aware that dressing as an "Indian" is inappropriate.

So I went to the slide show and saw this:

The caption (not shown because it has been changed) was "The Indian."*

I replied to the Robertson's tweet. Here's a screenshot of the tweets:

Reading Robertson's reply, I went back to the slideshow to see the adjustment. Here's what he did:

This time you see the caption. It says "FEATHERS" instead of "The Indian."*

That, of course, is no better.

That the photograph made its way onto a list of "favorite" costumes tells me that some people at Vanity Fair, a magazine I subscribe to, are clueless about this issue. That's a bit surprising to me, especially given the coverage of fashion designers who have been called out for appropriation of Native intellectual property. Native Appropriations has been doing an excellent job of documenting the fashion industry's appropriation (click here to get a list of posts Adrienne has done on this topic). Paul Frank responded to criticism of a fashion event by working with Native designers.

What can Vanity Fair do?

I recommend they read the report recently released by the National Congress of American Indians. While the title specifies mascots, the contents of the report have broader application. Obviously, it applies to images of American Indians in children's and young adult literature.

We (by we, I mean American society) are stuck in an ugly cycle in which this kind of stereotyping happens again and again, year after year. Unfortunately, it is a money maker for those who do it. On her Facebook page, my daughter pointed to the "Sexy Indian" costumes available from a Halloween costume company. She opened by referencing statistics about how many Native women are sexually assaulted (one in three) by non-Native men, making the point that dressing up and playing Indian are not harmless activities. These activities are indicative of an ignorant society that refuses to see American Indian people as people.

A powerhouse like Vanity Fair can help interrupt that cycle by publishing an essay that takes a hard look at playing Indian/dressing Indian. They can show their readers how much it happens. This means starting with children's books and activities in which children are shown or encouraged to play Indian. It means taking on esteemed children's book authors and illustrators, and the Boy Scouts, and, the Washington Redskins, too.

That's what Vanity Fair can do.

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*In my original post, I made an error. The caption was not "An Indian." It was "The Indian." My post has been edited to correct the error.

"Benny's Wigwam" by Mrs. Mary Catherine Lee

In 1883, D. Lothrop & Company published a book called Wide Awake Pleasure Book consisting of several volumes of a children's magazine called Wide Awake.  There are several items in it that I'll want to write about sometime, but today (Halloween), I've chosen to share "Benny's Wigwam" by Mrs. Mary Catherine Lee.

"Benny's Wigwam" was first published in Volume 17, No. 6 of Wide Awake, dated November 1883, but Google Books shows me that D. Lothrop & Company also published it in 1886 in The Little Gold Miners of the Sierras and Other Stories. You can read the story in its entirety by clicking on that link. Here's the illustration that goes with the story:

In "Benny's Wigwam," it is the first day of vacation. Benny Briggs sets out to "see the old Witch" (p. 334) that has moved into an abandoned woodcutter's hut near their home. His little sister goes (called Pettikins or Fanny) with him. When they get to the hut, Fanny exclaims over the broomstick and black cat they see at the hut. They're startled to hear her voice behind them, telling them there aren't any laws against her having a cat or a broomstick. She asks the children "What are you skeered of?" (p. 335).

With that question, they enter a conversation in which the children ask her why she's so queer. She tells them (p. 335):

"I'm exterminated. You don't know what that is, I s'pose?"

Benny stammers that it means to drive out, to put an end to, to destroy utterly. The woman tells Benny she learned what it meant back when she was the age of Fanny (p. 335):

"That's when the colonel said we must move west'ard,"said the witch, laying her pipe down on the log, leaning her elbows on her knees, and resting her bony jaws in the palms of her hands. "Injuns, before they're exterminated, stick to their homes like other folks."

Debbie's comments: The author/old woman are referring to removal. The use of the word "exterminated" can be traced to Thomas Jefferson's use of that word in 1807, when he said that "if ever we are constrained to lift the hatchet against any tribe, we will never lay it down until that tribe is exterminated, or driven beyond the Mississippi." Would a Native woman have used the word "Injun" to describe herself? I kind of doubt it. That said, the author is sympathetic and her "like other folks" is an attempt to depict Native people as same-as-everyone-else. I'm curious, though, about the period. Is this old woman talking about Jefferson and the removal known as the Trail of Tears? What tribe is this old woman? Is she a Cherokee? What is she doing in the northeast?

Benny doesn't believe she's an "Injun" because she doesn't look like the pictures he's seen, and she doesn't look like the (p. 335-336)

"magnificent figures he had seen in front of the cigar stores in New Haven. Where were all her feathers and things--her red and yellow tunic, her gorgeous moccasins, her earrings and noserings and bracelets and armlets and beads? Why, she was just ragged and dirty!"

Debbie's comments: It is interesting to read about what he expected, and what formed those expectations. I wonder what pictures he'd seen? "Benny's Wigwam" came out in 1883.  Earlier in the book, there's this drawing:

The drawing is just there--no story goes with it. The artist is listed (in the table of contents) as George Foster Barnes. Benny may also be thinking of Indians he saw in Peter Parley's Tales about America, published in 1830.

As for cigar store Indians... well, there's plenty of examples of them! Do an image search and you'll find them.  

Benny asks the old woman if she really is an "Injun" and she says:

"Well, I was. I ain't nothing at all now. I ain't even a squaw, and they said they was going to make a Christian on me. I was a Chetonquin."

Debbie's comments: With that passage, we are given a tribe. Chetonquin. As far as I know, there is no tribe called Chetonquin. I'll keep reading Benny's Wigwam and see if I learn more about that. Regarding making her into a Christian, that was certainly going on! 

The old woman tells Benny that her people did not want to go west. They fought the colonel. She was a little girl at the time and hid behind a tree to watch the fight. She saw her father get shot and ran to him. She got shot, too, and shows Benny and Fanny the scar, saying (p. 336):

"A bullet grazed me hard and I was stunned and blinded with the blood, and couldn't run, but my people had to."

The old woman says Colonel Hammerton (this is the first time she names him)...

"took a notion to pick me up when he rode over the ground he had soaked with the blood of my people--ground that belonged to my people," shrieked the woman, straightening herself up and shaking her fists in the air. 

Debbie's comments: I'm glad to see that the woman's command of English is pretty good. The author didn't give the woman that stilted speech pattern in which almost every word ends in "-um" and I'm also glad to see the woman speak the truth about the land itself and who it belonged to. I don't know what battle the old woman saw as a child. The only "Colonel Hammerton" that I've come up with is the one in this story. 

The old woman says that Colonel Hammerton took her to Washington where she had to stay in houses, which she didn't like. She ran away several times and they finally gave up and let her go. And since then, she's been searching for her people. She was told:

they was exterminated, every one on 'em. Yes, I've been a-going ever since, but I can't go any more.

And so, she's stopped moving and hopes she can stay in this forest. She doesn't want to be in a house because the Great Spirit won't be able to find her. She wants to be found, soon, and pleads with Benny to carry her wish to his people. He tells her not to worry, because the woods they're in belong to his relations, and he'll look after her.

Debbie's comments: White people saving or rescuing Indians is a common trope. Not a good one, I should add!

The old woman is very grateful to Benny. She looks around her, saying that when she came into this wood, she felt she was in the right place, and she almost expected to see wigwams.  She wishes she could sleep in one. Benny tells her sleeping in wigwams is something he and his friends had done when playing Indian. They know how to make them. He offers to make one for her.

Debbie's comments: Hmmm... I think is may be the oldest reference I've seen to playing Indian.  

Benny goes home to gather his friends so they can build the wigwam. He tells his parents, too, about the old woman. They're very sympathetic (p. 337):

[T]heir excellent hearts were at once filled with compassion for so forlorn a creature. Mr. Briggs had very radical theories about equal mercy and justice for each member of the human race.

Debbie's comments: There were, in fact, people like Mr. and Mrs. Briggs. During the period when removal of the Cherokee's was being discussed, there were active letter-writing campaigns in which white women objected to removal. This is referenced in the Trail of Tears episode of the PBS Series, We Shall Remain. 

Mr. and Mrs. Briggs tried to get her into more comfortable quarters than the forest, but she wanted to be there, so they left her alone, making sure she had whatever she needed to be comfortable. Over the summer, she lost touch with reality. People came to "understand and respect the sorrows of the poor creature they had talked of as a witch" (p. 338).

As winter drew near, Benny was intent on making her a wigwam. He got a person named 'Bijah to help him. 'Bijah had been to Dakota and saw "life-size" wigwams. In a chest, he's got buffalo and other kids of robes. He gets to work on them and they make one. Exhausted, Benny goes to bed and (p. 338):

dreamed he was the chief of a powerful tribe, and that he found old Winneenis, not old any longer, but a little girl like Fanny, crying in the forest because she couldn't find her way to her people, and that he took her by the hand and led her home.

Debbie's comments: Here, near the end, we learn the woman's name: Winneenis. 

In the morning, he and his friends head to the wigwam and are surprised to find the old woman asleep inside. The boys peek at her but decide to let her sleep. Hours pass and she doesn't wake. 'Bijah goes inside and comes out to report that Winneenis is dead. The final paragraph is this (p. 339):

Wandering, as was her wont at night, she had come upon Benny's wigwam, standing in the clear moonlight, and to her longing, bewildered mind, it had probably seemed the wigwam of her father. Who can ever know the joy, the feeling of peace, and rest, and relief, with which she laid her tired bones down in it, and fell asleep, a care-free child once more, and thus passed from its door into the happy hunting-grounds? And Benny always felt glad the wigwam had been built.

Debbie's comments: An interesting story... I think it is much like other writings of that time period that were sentimental pleas for tolerance, equality, and reform. It also reflects, however, the author's lack of knowledge about a specific tribal nation. Mrs. Lee (the author) uses a good many stereotypical words and ideas (like happy hunting ground). As for the opening, where the old woman is thought to be a witch... I'll have to do some reading to make sense of that! For now, I'll hit the upload button and greet the trick or treater's at my door this evening. (This is going live without a close read for typos, etc. Let me know if you see some! Or bad writing! And let me know, too, what you think of the story.)

Dorothy Kunhardt and Garth Williams' ROGER MOUSE'S WISH

Editor's Update, 6:30 PM on April 10, 2013: Mary sent me text and scans of three pages of Roger Mouse's Wish. I've inserted that material. Thanks, Mary!

________________________________

Earlier today (April 10, 2013), reader Mary C. wrote to tell me about Roger Mouse's Wish. It is a Tiny Golden Book. I'm going to add these tiny books to my "find out more..." list! I'm pretty sure that I've seen them. Tiny is right... they measure 3 inches by 2 inches.

According to James Fox at the Simmons blog, all the books were written by Dorothy Kunhardt and illustrated by Garth Williams, and published around 1948. Here's the back and front cover for Roger Mouse's Wish:

Due to limits on how much of a text someone can use without getting permission of the publisher, I'm telling you what the book is about (based on what Mary sent me) and including a few excerpts. There are three characters: Roger Mouse, Mr. Mouse (his father) and Mrs. Mouse (his mother).

One day, Roger Mouse asks his mother for a blanket. He spreads it on a card table in their living room. He crawls under the card table and then hears his mother tell his father that she remembers how much fun she had playing house. Roger replies:

I'm not playing house," said Roger's voice. "I'm an Indian. This is my tepee."

The next day is Roger's birthday. There's a birthday cake for him. Mr. Mouse tells him to make a wish, and Mrs. Mouse tells him not to tell anyone what he wished for because it might not come true. Roger makes his wish and blows out the candles, and Mr. Mouse tells him there's a present for him "in front of his tepee." Here's that page:

The present, he exclaims is an "Indian suit!" He's quite happy and tries it on:

Wearing his Indian suit, he asks his father if he can tell his wish. His dad thinks it won't hurt, so he does:

As you can see, his wish was for an Indian suit.

That was a popular wish around that time...

Leo Politi, author of the flawed, award winning Song of the Swallows also wanted an Indian suit. He got one, too, as described in his 1951 book, Little Leo: 

Lot of playing Indian going around then... and years before then... and sadly, in the years since then, too!

Kunhardt is the author of Pat the Bunny and a gross book called Brave Mr. Buckingham, in which a guy dresses up like an Indian, and page by page, loses body parts until all that's left is his head. In a headdress. Williams did the illustrations for a whole slew of books including the Indians in Little House on the Prairie. 

I've looked and looked but can't find any illustrations of the inside of Roger Mouse's Wish. If you have a copy, please let me know! I'd like to know more about the story and see more of the illustrations. Thanks!

A great big thanks, Mary, for letting me know about the book, and then for taking time to type out the text and scan those pages! By the way, Mary wrote to me in response to an update to my post about the stereotypes in Little Golden Books. If you want to see them, here's the link: Stereotypes in Little Golden Books.

Dear John Segal, author of PIRATES DON'T TAKE BATHS

On AICL, there's a page of "the foul among the good" that catalogs books in which Native people are stereotyped, objectified, and mocked in celebrated or popular children's books. Some of the images there are in old books that are still being published, and some are from newly published books. I've got another new one to add...

John Segal's Pirates Don't Take Baths is about a pig (kid) who does not want to take a bath. The pig proclaims "No! No! No! I'm not taking a bath. Not tonight. Not tomorrow. Never." The pig parent says "Never?" 

From there, kid-pig imagines him/herself (gender not specified) as "someone else." Here's the summary from the publisher's page:

For any young child (or pig), there are few things more excruciating, more traumatic, more torturous than bathtime. And this little pig is putting his hoof down. No. More. BATHS. But how can he possibly accomplish this? Well, by being someone else, of course. After all, everyone knows that pirates, astronauts, and knights in shining armor - just to name a few - never, EVER take baths. Now if only he can convince his mother . . .

In his hilarious new picture book that is sure to become an integral part of bathtime routines, John Segal documents one particular skirmish in this never-ending battle of wills.

With each "someone else" pig-kid comes up with, pig-parent counters with a reason why the "someone" won't work. For example, pig-parent tells pig-kid that pig-kid can't be a pirate, because pig-kid gets seasick. So, pig-kid moves on to another "someone."

Most of the suggestions pig-kid comes up with are things someone can choose to be.

Astronaut? A job one might choose... Knight in shining armor? Ditto. Cowboy? Again, a choice. Same thing for treasure hunter.

In the midst of all this someone-elsing is Eskimo.

Pig-kid says "I'm an Eskimo. They can't bathe. Its TOO COLD."

Pig-parent says "Yes, but do you know what Eskimos eat? Whale blubber and walrus liver." To which pig-kid says "Blubber and liver? That's gross."

Come on, John Segal! Eskimos--who prefer Inuit, Inupiaq and their own names for who they are--take baths. You're having fun at their expense, and you're contributing to misinformation about people who Americans know so little about!

I'm curious, Mr. Segal...

You've got kid-pig playing Cowboy on one page, but you don't have the usual playing Indian alongside it. I wonder why you didn't do that? I'd like to think you knew better, but the Eskimo page tells me otherwise. Playing Eskimo is just as bad as playing Indian.

And---what's up with making fun of food Alaska Natives eat?! As Erin (a librarian who works with Inupiaq children) writes in her review at Goodreads,

The Iñupiaq people practice a subsistence lifestyle that many people may regard as “gross” because it is unfamiliar. Bowhead whales are harvested and used to feed the entire community. 

Erin writes that she's sending the book back to the publisher. I wonder if she included a letter stating why. I hope so! And, I wonder what would happen if ten people did that?

Segal's choice to make light of Alaska Natives backfires. For a thoughtful essay on humor, take a few minutes to read Uma Krishnaswami's article at Horn Book: "No Joke! Humor and Culture in Middle-Grade Books." Though her essay focuses on middle-grade books, her words apply to picture books, too.

"This is Not Who I Am, And this is Not OK"

Last year, students in Ohio University's S*T*A*R*S (Students Teaching About Racism in Society) student group launched a campaign to push back on Halloween costumes of cultural groups. They created a series of posters, including this one, in which the people (in the photo) are wearing feathered headbands, in what they believe to be Indian costumes.

The campaign got some national media attention from CNN. Dressing up as an "Indian" is not ok. Though it is often well-intentioned, its outcome is generally one that puts ones ignorance on display. Will you say anything to students you see dressed like Indians this Halloween? I hope so.

Stereotypes and the Canonization of Kateri Tekakwitha

Catholics and a great many Native people know that Kateri Tekakwitha was canonized a few hours ago in Rome. She is now a saint. Some news stories acknowledge the complex history and emotions around the idea of Native people embracing a faith that saw their own as pagan and therefore its practitioners as less-than-human. For those who are able to set aside the human impulse to see others as less-than and instead focus on a creator, the canonization of Kateri Tekakwitha is an important moment.

I know a great many people---many whom I care about---that are in Rome for the canonization. As I search the news media for stories about it, I'm disappointed in the ways in which stereotypes of American Indians are part of this moment. There's this photo:

Compare it to this photo, from the same news gallery.

The difference is notable, and it makes me wonder who the nun is, where she got that headdress, and why she wanted to wear it. (The source for both photos is The Daily Gazette in Schenectady, NY: http://www.dailygazette.com/news/2012/oct/21/1020_kateri/)


NBC's coverage includes this line:

And yet, at the age of 20, Kateri swapped the Totem for the Crucifix.

I wonder what that reporter means by "Totem"? Sadly, Tekakwitha's canonization is being used as another opportunity to dress up like Indians:

The date of Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha’s canonization is going to be October 21, 2012! (Yay!) The cool thing about soon-to-be-Saint Kateri is that she was Native American. This opens up all kinds of crafting possibilities!  Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha’s feast day is July 14. We made some fun, Native American dress up crafts to celebrate St. Kateri’s canonization with my kids!

Here's the photo directly beneath that paragraph:

There's no excuse for the NBC reporter's comment. I do not know what to think about the nun in the headdress. The Catholics-playing-Indian activities are well-intentioned, but ignorant and ought to be set aside. As a society, we need not do these sorts of activities. We see it a lot in the context of "Indian" mascots for sports teams. There's a lot more awareness of stereotyping in that context, and a lot of schools have abandoned those stereotypical mascots. That same awareness--apparently--needs to be developed amongst Catholics who dress their kids up in stereotypical attire to be "Saint Kateri."

-----
Update, Sunday Oct 21, 2012
Native news media coverage of the canonization:
Turtle Island Indigenous Flock to Vatican to Witness Canonization, Indian Country Today 
Chicago Delegation Joins Thousands of American Indians for Canonization, Native News Network 

Day three with Karen Russell's SWAMPLANDIA!

Editor's note: I finished reading Russell's book. I do not recommend it. I do not recommend playing Indian, in fact or fiction. 

___________________________

Two days ago I started reading Karen Russell's Swamplandia, writing up summaries and my comments for each chapter as I read. Yesterday, I read a few more chapters, summarizing and commenting as I read. Today, I finished the book.

Note 1: My comments on each chapter are indented and in bold text. Plain font is for summary.
Note 2: Don't read any further if you don't want to know what happens in the book. In other words, Note 2 is a spoiler alert.
Note 3: I'm reading the book in ebook format. I don't have reliable page numbers for excerpts I use below. At some point I'll get a hard copy and add page numbers.

_______________

Chapter Fifteen: Help Arrives, Then Departs
Ava and the Bird Man are out on the water and swamp areas, headed to the Eye of the Needle. Ava tells the Bird Man that there are a lot of Seminole ghosts out there and that her sister is "...named for a Seminole chieftain. The whites killed him with malaria. He died in Fort Moultrie, South Carolina."

Debbie's comments:
Ava calls him a chieftain and I do see that term in some sources but the ones by Native scholars like Theda Purdue use "war chief" instead. He did die of malaria at Fort Moultrie, but before he was there, he, his wives, and his children were held at a prison in Saint Augustine. Another awful detail: Purdue writes that he was buried headless because an Army doctor "made off with his head as a trophy" (page 190, The Columbia Guide to American Indians of the Southeast by Theda Purdue and Michael D. Green). In The Native Peoples of North America: A History, Volume 1, Bruce E. Johansen writes that the doctor was a surgeon named Frederick Weedon, and that he kept Osceola's head in a medical museum until it was destroyed in a fire in 1866.  If interested, you can read testimony of three military officers who verified that Weedon had the head. Will we find out WHY "the Chief" and his wife chose that name for their daughter?! 

Ava continues:

After the Indian Removal Act was passed in 1830, the Seminole people were hunted like animals. They built the palm-thatched chickees for use as temporary shelters, hiding places. President Jackson sent a letter to the Seminoles that we reproduced in our museum, the last line of which reads:

"But should you listen to the bad birds that are always flying about you, and refuse to remove, I have directed the commanding officer to remove you by force."

She provides more history, and then says:

My sister was named for the Seminoles' famous warrior and freedom fighter, War Chief Osceola, who, legend has it, said, at a time when General Jessup was upon them, and all seemed lost:

"If the Great Spirit will show me how, I will make the white man red with blood; and then blacken him in the sun and rain... and the buzzard live upon his flesh."

Debbie's comments:

Jackson's statement is in a letter. You can read it here in the Library of Congress publication. Scroll down and read details about how the removal was to be carried out. The only place I'm able to locate the second excerpt (Osceola's words) is in "Outing Magazine" which was a sports magazine published in the late 1800 and early 1900s. Russell precedes that excerpt with "legend has it" which gives her the space to attribute those words to him. This reminds me of Gina Capaldi's picture book biography of Carlos Montezuma. She went overboard, putting words into his mouth. Her disclaimer is less visible than a passage preceded with "legend has it."

Ava goes on:

These Seminoles, the "real" Indians that the chief envied in a filial and loving way, were in fact the descendants of many displaced tribes from the Creek Confederacy. This swamp was not their ancestral home either, not by any stretch--they had been pushed further and further into the swamp by President Jackson's Tennessee boys and a company of scarecrows from Atlanta, a militia that was starved and half-crazed. We Bigtrees were an "indigenous species" of swamp dweller, according to the Chief and our catalogs, but it turned out that every human in the Ten Thousand Islands was a recent arrival. 

Debbie's comments:

Why does Russell have "real" in quotation marks, followed by information that says the Seminoles are descendants of displaced tribes? She is also collapsing a lot of history into a too-small period, and then she says her family and the Indians of the area are all the same. That's unsettling! It is a bold attack on the sovereignty of the tribes who were there!

Ava talks a bit about the Calusa's and then says:

...it was not until the late 1800s that our swamp was recolonized by freed slaves and by fugitive Indians and, decades later, by the shocked, drenched white pioneers shaking out wet deeds, true sitting ducks, the patsies of the land barons who had sold these gullible snowbirds farms that were six feet underwater. And then by "eccentrics" like the Bird Man and my parents. 

Debbie's comments:

That suggests that there was nobody there at all between 1830 when the Removal Act was passed and the late 1800s. I suppose it depends on what "recolonized" means.  The Seminole tribe says they never left:

Historians estimate there may have been only a few hundred unconquered Seminole men, women and children left - all hiding in the swamps and Everglades of South Florida. No chicanery, no offer of cattle, land, liquor or God, nothing could lure the last few from their perches of ambush deep in the wilderness. The U.S. declared the war ended - though no peace treaty was ever signed - and gave up.

The Florida survivors comprised at least two main factions: Maskoki speakers who lived near Lake Okeechobee and those who spoke the linguistically-related Hitchiti tongue (also called Miccosukee or Seminole) and lived to the south. In the remote environs of such uncharted Florida wilderness, the Seminoles remained, living in small traditional camps of cypress frame/palmetto-thatch chickees, isolated from Florida society and the rest of the world until well into the 20th century . . . long after most tribes had experienced assimilation, religious conversion and cultural annihilation.

The descendants of these last few Indian resistors are the members of today's Seminole Tribe of Florida, the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida and the unaffiliated Independent or Traditional Seminoles.

Among the "white pioneers" Ava references decades later is her grandfather (remember, he purchased that land in 1930). 

The Bird Man asks Ava if her sister is like "the war chief Osceola" to which Ava says "Oh, no! She wears barrettes and stuff. She's a real girl-girl. She's not like us."

Debbie's comments:

Not like us... which means... What? What does it mean?

As they continue towards the Eye of the Needle, Ava wonders if Ossie has already made it home and found her note:

I pictured Ossie sitting Indian style on the burgundy sofa in her polka-dotted pajamas.

Debbie's comments:

Sitting "Indian style"?! We know what that means---with legs crossed. If this time period is 1980, then, Ava thinking "Indian style" makes sense. In recent years, use of that term has diminished as teachers become more aware of stereotyping. But, did it need to be in here at all? What if the sentence was "I pictured Ossie sitting on the burgundy soft in her polka-dotted pajamas." Does that take away from anything? Maybe Russell is trying to get us to see Ava as a product of her time. There are definitely plenty of people who understand the mistreatment of American Indians in historical contexts and still play Indian at Halloween or birthday parties, or, at sports events where a mascot is a stereotyped Indian.

Ava and the Bird Man talk a lot as they row/walk to the Eye of the Needle. He asks her if she knows about a bridge built in the 1920s. Ava nodded, told him about her grandfathers photos of African American bodies after the Labor Day hurricane of 1935. He took these photos to document something that official records did not. She goes on:

Most mainlanders hear "homeschooled" and they get the wrong impression. There were many deficits in our swamp education, but Grandpa Sawtooth, to his credit, taught us the names of whole townships that had been forgotten underwater. Black pioneers, Creek Indians, moonshiners, women, "disappeared" boy soldiers who deserted their army camps. From Grandpa we learned how to peer beneath the sea-glare of the "official, historical" Florida records we found in books. "Prejudice," as defined by Sawtooth Bigtree, was a kind of prehistoric arithmetic--a "damn fool math"--in which some people counted and others did not. It means white names on white headstones in the big cemetery on Cypress Point, and black and brown bodies buried in swamp water.

She calls her grandpa a true historian who is a true egalitarian:

Tragedies, too, struck blindly and you had to count everyone. Grandpa taught us more than any LCPS Teach Your Child ...! book about Florida hurricanes, Florida wars. From his stories we learned as children how to fire our astonishment at death into a bright outrage.

Debbie's comments:

Maybe it is grandpa's teaching that is at the root of Kiwi and Ava's frustration with their father for his persistence in playing Indian. 

Towards the end of the chapter, they run into Whip Jeters, a park ranger who has known Ava and her family for a long time. He's surprised to find her with the Bird Man, but Ava and the Bird Man convince Whip that they're cousins.

Chapter Sixteen: Kiwi Bigtree, World Hero

Recall that in chapter fourteen, Kiwi rescued (I should note that the girl he rescued wasn't really drowning; she was fooling around) a girl at the World of Darkness pool where he is working as a lifeguard.  In this chapter, the media swarms on the story, portraying him as a hero. He is interviewed and photographed or the newspaper:

He hadn't allowed himself to be photographed for the Swamplandia! brochures for years; in the most recent one he was fourteen, wearing his sister Osceola's red ribbon around his forehead and furious about it, a feather sticking up behind his head like a middle finger.

Debbie's comment:

This is some of the frustration that I mentioned earlier.

Kiwi realizes that this rescue story could help Swamplandia! and starts talking about it to the reporter, telling her that he belongs to the "Bigtree tribe of Swamplandia" and referring to the billboard of his father wearing a headdress. The reporter doesn't know what he's talking about but he goes on talking about Swamplandia hoping some of the information will make it into the newspaper. When he sees the paper the next day, he is disappointed that most of the article is about the girl, and that it says nothing about Swamplandia.

Chapter Seventeen: Ava's Eclipse
The niggling doubts Ava has been feeling are full blown by the end of this chapter. She and the Bird Man have found and passed the Eye of the Needle and pass by islands with people on them. Ava calls out, thinking Ossie is there, and the Bird Man slaps her.  She realizes she doesn't know who he is and that she was wrong to trust him. At one point she thinks of her dad, drunk on the couch, wearing his feathered headdress.

Debbie's comment:

I don't remember prior references to her father being drunk. I'm not making an association between the drunken Indian stereotype here, and I don't think Russell is either. Ava's thought makes me feel sad for her.

Chapter Eighteen: Kiwi Rolls the Dice
Kiwi goes to a Seminole-owned casino with two friend/co-workers. There is a beauty pageant taking place. Kiwi realizes that the pageant MC is his dad. He puts the money he has with him in an envelope and hands it to a dealer, asking her to give it to his dad. She tells Kiwi to take the money himself, that the man, Sammie, is a nice guy who they all love. Kiwi takes off, conflicted over what he's realizing. All these years, he believed his dad went on periodic month long trips to the mainland to meet with investors, but, it looks like those business trips were just periods when he works at jobs like this one.

Chapter Nineteen: The Silently Screaming World
The chapter opens with Ava realizing that the Bird Man is having sex with her. She doesn't struggle but shortly after that, she runs away. They've been gone from Swamplandia! two days. She spends a night alone huddled in the dark and the next morning gathers her thoughts and gets her bearings. She starts out for higher land.

Chapter Twenty: Out to Sea
Kiwi goes to visit his grandfather at the retirement home, hoping his grandfather can fill him in and affirm his suspicions about his dad.  But, his grandfather's mind is gone and they end up fighting. Kiwi goes back to his room at the World of Darkness and finds that his friend/co-workers have a new poster for him. They thought the poster Kiwi has of his mother is there for Kiwi to use when masturbating. In replacing it, they've torn it in half. They don't know that is his mother.

Chapter Twenty-One: Mama Weeds
Ava continues her journey through the swamps. She comes to a cabin with a clothesline on which are hung items she recognizes as Ossie's favorite shirt and Louis's jacket...  She thinks the woman who appears is a ghost named Mama Weeds. The woman is wearing a dress that Ava thinks once belonged to her mother. She tries to tear it off the woman, and then, she takes off again. She's got a piece of the dress in her hand and is wearing the jacket.

Debbie's comment:

The last chapters of this story are just as heavy and dark as they can be. I'm not at all sure that Ava is alive anymore... 

Chapter Twenty-Two: Kiwi Takes to the Skies
After rescuing the girl, Kiwi was promoted again, to pilot of an in-the-works World of Darkness airplane ride. In this chapter, he is able to fly a plane. While up, he sees a woman waving frantically at the plane. He decides to land (his instructor lets him try it), which he does successfully. He finds the barge and Ossie. She tells him that Louis Thanksgiving left her at the alter. The chapter closes with her asking about Ava.

Chapter Twenty-Three: The End Begins
The Bird Man finds Ava. She dives into an alligator pond, is bit on the leg, wrestles the alligator, and gets away from it. She swims through a tunnel and the Bird Man doesn't find her again. She hears the crackle of a park ranger's radio and is rescued. The ranger asks if she's related to Osceola Bigtree, who has also just been rescued. Ava, Ossie, and Kiwi are reunited and go to "the Chief's" hotel room. The family is reunited. They stay on the mainland. Ossie is on medication. Ava doesn't tell anyone about the Bird Man or what happened to her. The last paragraph ends with:

I think the Chief was right about one thing: the show really must go on. Our Seths are still thrashing inside us in an endless loop. I like to think our family is winning. But my brother and my sister and I rarely talk about it anymore--that would be as pointless as making a telephone call to say, "Kiwi, are you there? Listen: my blood is circulating" or, "Howdy, Ossie, it's today, are you breathing?" We used to have this cardboard clock on Swamplandia! and you could move the tiny red hands to whatever time you wanted, NEXT SHOW AT __:__ O'CLOCK.

Debbie's comments:

That's it. End of the story.  After I've had some time to think about the story, I'll write up those thoughts. In the meantime, I invite your thoughts and comments, either through the comments option below, or through the "Contact AICL" button in the bar at the top of the page. You can also write to me directly at dreese.nambe@gmail.com

Day Two with Russell's SWAMPLANDIA

Editor's note: I finished reading Russell's book. I do not recommend it. I do not recommend playing Indian, in fact or fiction. 

___________________________

Yesterday I started reading Karen Russell's Swamplandia, writing up summaries and my comments for each chapter as I read. I'm picking it up again today. Before reading below, go read Day One with Russell's Swamplandia where I wrote about chapters one thru five.

Note 1: My comments on each chapter are indented and in bold text. Plain font is for summary.
Note 2: Don't read any further if you don't want to know what happens in the book. In other words, Note 2 is a spoiler alert.
Note 3: I'm reading the book in ebook format. I don't have reliable page numbers for excerpts I use below. At some point I'll get a hard copy and add page numbers.

---------

Chapter Six: Kiwi's Exile in the World of Darkness

Kiwi takes a job at the World of Darkness, which is the reason tourists have stopped going to Swamplandia. There, he meets some unusual people like the oblivious character, Leonard Harlblower. Kiwi thinks:

Even Chief Bigtree--an "indigenous swamp dweller" who was actually a white guy descended from a coal miner in small-town Ohio, a man who sat on lizards in a fathered headdress--even the Chief seemed like a genius of self-awareness next to this kid Leonard.

Debbie's comments:

In chapter six, Russell used "indigenous" but without quotation marks. Here, she uses them. Is this inconsistency in her writing, or is it a way for the different characters to show that self-awareness?

Chapter Seven: The Dredge Appears
With "the Chief" gone, Ava and Ossie take care of Swamplandia and their property. This includes cutting down melaleuca, an invasive tree:

Ossie was cutting the saplings down, and I was painting herbicide onto the stumps. We were tree warriors, I told Ossie. We had come to the Last Ditch for a massacre.

"This is a pretty boring massacre," said my sister. "When is lunch?"

Debbie's comments:

Playing savage Indians now?! Russell's writing has a good bit of humor in it, but this particular stereotype (bloodthirsty savage massacring Indian) is not in the least bit amusing. 

It is while they are out cutting down the saplings that Ava and Ossie find an old dredge. Ossie starts trying to communicate with its ghosts. She takes up with one in particular, named Louis Thanksgiving.

Chapter Eight: Kiwi's Debt Increases
Payday finally arrives and Kiwi finds out that things he thought were free (his uniform, food he eats while at work, and a room he stays in at the theme park) are not free. Instead of a check, he is given a bill.

Chapter Nine: The Dredgeman's Revelation
Ossie is in love with Louis, calling him her boyfriend. Ossie tells Ava his life story, from birth to death. He had friends in the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC): "calm men, family men, bachelors, ex-preachers, hellions, white men, black men, the children of Indians and freed slaves"

Debbie's comments:

The CCC was a government work relief program that ran from 1933 to 1942.  Grandpa Sawtooth bought the island that would eventually have Swamplandia on it in 1932. That means the barge and work being done by its crew was done while he was there. I don't know if that matters later on in the story or not. 

I'm not sure that the CCC was integrated in a way that would have made it possible for Louis to work with black men, or with "children of Indians and freed slaves." I'm wondering why Russell used "children of Indians and freed slaves" instead of whatever word they were called in the 1930s.  I'm not sure that Louis would have worked alongside anyone who wasn't white. For the most part, the CCC wasn't integrated.

From his work on the CCC, Louis went to work on the dredge, but his friends chose not to go:

...the lone Indian on the crew, Euphon Tigertail, who had survived subhuman conditions while working on the Panama Canal, decided that he couldn't work in the swamp any longer. He'd been undone by miniscule foes, the chizzywinks, and the deer flies. "You sure you want to be a dredgeman for this outfit, Lou?" Euphon had whispered, both of them staring at the hulk of the dredge. 

Debbie's comments:
Hmmm...  I think this is the first time in the book that Russell provides us with words spoken by a Native character. Cool that it isn't stilted Indian-speak ("Um, that right, Kemosabe")!

Studying maps they found on the dredge, Ossie tells Ava that Louis has told her about a door to the underworld. Ava recognizes it as an Indian landmark called Eye of the Needle that is a day's hourney by airboat from their island. They had not been there, but their grandfather had:

Grandpa Sawtooth took a photograph of the Eye of the Needle passageway during his rambles in the forties: a gray channel cut between two twenty-acre islands made entirely of shells. These islands looked like twin boulders to me, or like one island that lived net to its echo. Two intricate skulls rising out of the river. They are hundreds or maybe even thousands of years old--the Calusa Indians constructed the mounds out of clay and every kind of local shell: oysters and conchs and whelks. The Calusa Indians were well established in our swamp when Ponce de Leon arrived in 1513, and they probably hugged the shoreline of Florida for hundreds of years before the European contact; by the late 1700s their tribe had disappeared, undone by Spanish warfare and enslavement, and by microbes: smallpox and measles. The Calusa shell mounds, these seashell archipelagos, had outlasted their architects by at least five hundred years. You can find them scattered throughout the Ten Thousand Islands; visitors will drag their kayaks up a shell mound's glittery shoes and picnic there. On the Gulf side a 150-acre shell mound supports a modern township. But the Eye of the Needle was a special landmark, known only to locals, and very remote.

Debbie's comments:

This is a history lesson! In a Google Everything search, the first hit was a social studies page that has much of the information Russell shares. Thankfully, Russell does not replicate the bias on that page (it presents the Calusa's as the aggressors in conflicts with the Spanish). A Google Videos search turned up an interesting documentary that dates one of the layers in a particular dig at 2000 years old. Ava, Ossie, and Kiwi are homeschooled but don't really study. In one place in the book, they worry at what grade level they'd be placed if they went to public school. That worry suggests the kids are not very well educated, so, the idea that Ava would know all this about the Calusa Indians kind of doesn't work.

On the third weekend without their father, Gus (he runs the ferry) comes to check on them. He finds Ava coloring, using "our Bigtree tribal colors: Indian red and heron blue."

Debbie's comments:
I'm curious about the time period for this story. Due to a way-cool effort by teachers, that "Indian red" crayon was retired in 1999 in response to teachers who felt that children wrongly perceived that color was intended to represent the skin color of American Indians. because children were using it on coloring sheets when they were coloring Indians. Crayola responded and changed the name to Chestnut. Below is a screenshot of the relevant part of their webpage. If the time setting for Swamplandia! is pre-1999, then it makes sense that the crayon is in the box that Ava is using. If it is post-1999, she could be using an old box. So--it is plausible and not necessarily a critique. More than anything, I suppose, I'm seizing Russell's use of "Indian red" as a teachable moment.  (In chapter nine, Ava watches the news and learns of the famine in Uganda. That was 1980, and again, in 2011.)

A few days later, Gus arrives with a letter for Ava. This one is from the Secretary to the President at the University of Loomis. It reads:

Thank you for your inquiry. I have done some research on your behalf; unfortunately no such Commission or Committee or alligator-wrestling competition has ever existed. You might visit the Miccosukee Indian Reservation to watch a live alligator show.

Ava tears the letter into bits.

Debbie's comment:
Hmm... Are we going to find out that the trophy is a fake? Part of the hype for the park?

The chapter ends with Ossie going into the dredge again to see Louis. Ava meets and befriends the Bird Man (he's a guy who travels around driving birds away from places they aren't wanted). When Ava returns there the next morning, the dredge is gone.

Chapter Ten: Kiwi Climbs the Ladder
Back at the World of Darkness theme park, Kiwi gets a new job as a life guard.

Chapter Eleven: Ava Goes to the Underworld
In a panic, Ava tells the Bird Man about Ossie and the missing dredge. Reluctantly, she also tells him about Louis, the ghost boyfriend. To her surprise, he believes in ghosts and knows where the Eye of the Needle is. He agrees to help Ava find Ossie.

Chapter Twelve: Kiwi Goes to Night School
Kiwi goes to the local community college to begin a GED class. When it is his turn, he introduces himself and tells his classmates he needs to help his dad get out of debt and wants to go to college. Students immediately start ridiculing him, calling him "white boy." He wishes he could tell them about the island:

...about Chief Bigtree's "Indian" lineage; how as a kid they'd put makeup and beads on him, festooned him with spoonbill feathers and reptilian claws; how at fourteen he'd declared: "I'm a Not-Bigtree. A Not-Indian. A Not-Seminole. A Not-Miccosukee." This category "white" gave him a whistling fear, a feeling not unlike agoraphobia.

Debbie's comments:

Recall in chapter two, Kiwi is frustrated when his dad tries to talk to them in a booming "chieftain" voice? Here, we learn that Kiwi didn't like playing Indian. Seems like he thought he had no culture, and being called white, or realizing that his identity is being ridiculed, scares him. 

Chapter Thirteen: Welcome to Stiltsville
Ava and the Bird Man stop at an abandoned village on stilts (Stiltsville) for the night.

Chapter Fourteen: The Drowning Chain
The drowning chain is a net used to rescue swimmers. At the end of the chapter, Kiwi (not using the drowning chain) rescues and revives a girl. Crowds gather round and take photos of him.

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That's it for Day 2 of Swamplandia!