Except the troubles at home, he faces more challenges in reservation where his peers and even some adults regard him as a bulling target。 In such situation, book is the only thing that can help him to escape the hard reality。 However, in school, he finds that his text book was once used by his mother。 There is never a time like this moment when he finds the reservation so poor and hopeless。 During a conversation with his teacher, he decides to pursue a life with hope and lives a different life from his tribes。
In the second part，Junior leaves his troubled school on the Reservation to attend an all-white farm town
high school, which is an action of betrayal in some Indians’ eyes。 In junior’s first year in Reardan, he struggles for a suitable place between whites and American Indians。 On the one hand, Junior becomes a promising student with his great effort in Reardan。 One the other hand, he is almost devastated by something terrible happens in Res, including his grandmother and sister’s death because of alcohol。
In the third part, with loneliness and an intense love for Reservation, he still decides to leave Res and seek for a better life in white world。 He gets the support from family and forgiveness from his tribe。
What surprises readers most might be the fact that how hopeless a nation is。 However, what causes a deeper thinking is American Indians’ ways to face their terrible situation, including alcohol and laugh, which more or less make their miserable lives become an ethnic destiny。
1。3 Background of the novel
To know the context of the book, it’s essential to know the current living situation of American Indians and the basic causes that lead to the current situation。
American Indiansareknown as the Native American。In the 20th century, although American Indians are the beneficiaries of the American social welfare system, according to Dippie, Brian W, in his study—The
Vanishing American, Indian is a varnishing nation, facing many problems。 First, they have low life expectancy。 In the 20 century, although there have been huge increases in American Indians’ average life expectancy, the American Indians’ life expectancy only the two thirds of white Americans’。[6] Second, the nation has high unemployment rate。 In 2003, the unemployment of American Indians reached 49%; In some mountainous reservations, the digital could reaches 70 %。[3] Third, most of American Indians are alcoholics。 It’s hard to calculate how many American Indiansare alcoholics, but according to the novel, only four people in Spokane
Reservation do not drink。 in 1975, A Hopi Indian who have received higher education once said，the American
Indians who were “in the survival as well as cultural trouble ”, live a schizophrenic life, a mix of American
Indians’lives and whites’ lives。 He couldn’t handle it and that’s why he started to be a alcoholism in order to elude those problems。[10] In the 1970s, according to the study of aresearch center in Oklahoma, American Indians lack the resistance to alcohol genetically。 In addition, the severe depression as well as malnutrition is also the reason why American Indians tend to have alcohol poisoning。[11]文献综述
The severe living situation is mainly cause by historical issues。
First, the policy called “the Indian Removal Act” led to the current isolation of American Indians and their small population。 In 1830, the congress passed the “the Indian Removal Act”which required American Indians to leave their mother land and remove to the west of Mississippi river。 The law was implemented by force。[14] According to a statistics, in the 1930s, more than half of the American Indians who were forced to move to the west died in the way of leaving their hometown。 More than 4000 Cherokee American Indians died。 The way of moving to the west was also called “Trail Of Tears”。[8] Second, the hunting of buffalo deprived American Indians of their traditional living styles。 There is an old saying in a tribe: “our lives rely on buffalo, we get 谢尔曼·阿莱克西眼中的印第安人式幽默(3):http://www.youerw.com/yingyu/lunwen_165451.html