Analysis Of The Poem ' Indian Horse '

In all aspects of life, Humans spend an incredible amount of time wondering if their class is high enough and acceptable. We tend to care so much about what others think of us, that we expect so much more from ourselves than what is possible. Which, in short represents that we are not living for ourselves. The lives we were given to enjoy as a whole and embrace. Rather we are living someone else’s life, which locks us in a dark prison of expectations and the key to freedom gets thrown away. Living a life where you care so much about what others think of you is as if we are nothing but sheep being herded to the final slaughterhouse! In “Rocking Horse Winner”, the author D.H. Lawrence paints a portrait of how the mother Hester can never truly be satisfied with what she poseses since she is always worried about the status and ranking of her class. The most important concern to her is looking respectable, presentable, and nice. In addition, in the story “A Goodman Is Hard To Find”, the author Flannery O’Connor paints the same portrait representing how the Grandmother always has to look presentable, and how she always has to look like a lady. Both of these characters in both stories have the same problem in common. They both are haunted by the fact that they

The poem I have deconstructed is, “How to be a Real Indian” by Kenzie Allen. “How to be a Real Indian” consists of two stanzas. The poem is in a first person point of view. This poem was deconstructed in order to gain a greater interpretation of how and why it was written. To interpret what more the speaker was trying to convey through their writing.

Individuals, who are surrounded with agony by mistreatment at an early phase, often leave with wounds in which can trouble their lives. In Richard Wagamese’s Indian Horse, the Aboriginal children struggle with traumatization caused by dreadful brutality from the white people at the St. Jerome’s Residential School. Unfortunately for the children, the abuse leaves them upset for a lifetime. The children experience cruel abuse, which leading to leaving them mentally damaged.

“When your people are degenerated, when the family you came from is denounced and your tribal ways and rituals are pronounced backwards, primitive, savage, you come to see yourself as less than human. That is hell on earth, that sense of unworthiness. That’s what they [the residential school] inflicted on us.”(Wagamese, 81) is the heart-wrenching way Saul expresses this. By making the children feel this way, they are making them question and doubt their Native identity, which is the first step, to losing it completely. Secondly, Saul starts to conform to the way people expect him to be and loses who he actually is. This goes on until it gets even in the way of Saul playing hockey. When his coach confronts him about it, all Saul can say is “‘Hey, I’m just giving them what they want.’ ‘Who?’ [the coach asks] ‘The crowd, the team. Don’t you read the papers? I’m the rampaging redskin.’”(165) Showing how Saul seems to have accepted his fate as a stereotypical Indian and player; forgetting the thoughtful and insightful person he used to be. Finally, towards the end of

Residential school is like a nightmare for the Indigenous people during the last century. In Richard Wagameses’s book, Indian Horse, telling the story of Saul’s life who is an Ojibway boy being taken to residential school. The novel mainly talks about how Saul uses hockey and alcohol to find healing and escapism and how he investigates his character. The theme of healing and escapism is mainly explored through Saul’s story of hockey and alcohol. Additionally, Saul’s character has changed from an innocent Ojibway boy into a precocious adolescent into a chaotic adult to become a dynamic character.

At St. Jerome’s Indian Residential School, Saul sees the lonely world, which crams on him like a black hole with no light, however it creates a determination for him to endure. As he is expeditiously thrown into the vast world of a different religion, he quickly realizes,

Also, Richard in the story openly expresses his hate for being a victim of Canada’s residential school system when he said, “I ascribed all my pain to residential schools and to those responsible. I blamed churches for my alcoholism, loneliness, shame, fear inadequacy, and failures”. This shows that Richard is infuriated with the Christian

In Zora Neale Hurtson’s ethnography, Tell My Horse (1938), she uses her research and field notes from her year in the Caribbean islands to study how the political atmosphere and culture tie into the religion of Vodoun. Being one of the first in her field to study this religion, Hurston hoped to expand research upon the subtle nuances within the African diaspora and increase the people of Caribbean’s acceptance of their African identity. In doing so, Hurtson found her research discouraged the idea of Pancaribbeanism and diminished stereotypes of Vodoun being a religion based upon only evil possession and pagan sacrifice.

Native Guard is a poem that is built on a lot of passion and precision that makes this entire book of poetry stand out. From the beginning with the elusive imagery and foreshadowing of her childhood and her mother’s life we are easily engulfed in the lifestyle of being born in the south. The imagery continues on in the new memory of the pinnacle time of slavery and the Civil War, which shows the true nature of the south through repetition and metaphoric sentences of many gruesome and remorseful scenes.

Everyone has a different way to deal with overwhelming situations. It can be more difficult for people with mental illness to cope with the hardships of life. For instance, in “Horses of the Night,” the character of Chris has dissociative symptoms that can be linked to his depression. Margaret Laurence’s short story tells the story of Chris, a young teenager who moves to from a small farm to the town of Manawaka in order to go to high school. The story is told by his younger cousin, Vanessa. As she grows up, she learns that Chris is depressed. The author uses the theme of fantasy to show that he does not cope well with reality. The horses, Shallow Creek, and the children are symbols that show us the fantasy that Chris lives in.

The decimation of a Community is an important aspect of how stability and control are lost in both Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart (1958) and Richard Wagamese’s Indian Horse (2012). In these culturally unique texts, both protagonists experience the transition from being a part of a community to being unwillingly pushed away from it and seeing it slowly being destroyed. The result of both protagonists being forced out of their beloved communities causes them to go down a spiral path thereby losing control and stability in their lives. The progression in which stability and control are possessed and then lost in both novels forces the characters to adapt to the changes at hand.

In the book Broken Circle: The Dark Legacy of Indian Residential Schools, the author discusses his gruesome experiences while attending the Indian Residential School systems. Theodore Fontaine was stripped away from his family at the young age of seven, and sent to a residential school, operated by the Canadian government. Fontaine begins the book by explaining his joyful and culturally rich life as a young Ojibway child. Later, Fontanne was forced to attend Fort Alexander Residential School, where he was punished for displaying any aspect of his indigenous culture. These punishments include insidious forms of abuse: emotional, physical, and sexual. The story of a young, innocent child, experiencing such misery and distresses is an example

In his essay, “Horse and Gentlemen,” T.H. Breen describes the cultural significance of gambling, specifically in relation to the quarter-horse races, in late 17th century Virginia. Breen primarily argues that the three main aspects of gambling – competitiveness, materialism, and individualism – reflected and reinforced the socio-economic structure of Virginia in this period. The high stakes wagers of the affluent planters reinforced their dominant status in the social structure and the gentry’s right to rule over this colony. Breen’s argument to this effect is supported by letters, court transcripts, documentation of wagers, and other written first-hand accounts. Breen’s case for the cultural significance of gambling has persuasive arguments for its representation of competitiveness and materialism. However, his argument for individualism has contrary elements and his essay would have been improved with the inclusion of women’s role in the gambling culture.

The impoverished conditions in which the residents of this community live are difficult based on the surrounding violence and discrimination they face. Tre, Ricky’s best friend, is able to survive the surrounding violence and discrimination through his father’s sensational leadership; he therefore knows what to do in situations he faces among his friends. However, his friends are not so lucky. For example, Dough doesn’t have great leadership or a father figure, but is raised by a single mother who is determined to get her children to succeed; nevertheless, her main focus is Ricky because he has the most potential; he is an athlete who has trouble in school, but obtains All-American in football, looking to get a scholarship to USC. The mother’s lack of leadership over

Indian horse by Richard Wagamese allowed me to open my eyes on the issues of Aboriginal people dealing with all the horrible pains and abusive trauma from the residential school. Before reading this book, I felt like I was educated well enough to understand how much aboriginal people suffered through generations and how much they have lost compared to what they had before. However, after reading this book I was able to see through First nation’s perspective and realized it's not just knowing about what aboriginal people have been through throughout the history. In this novel, the author allowed me to see Saul’s life transitioning ,where in the beginning saul was living the indigenous way of life with his family, but eventually forced to be