Assertion Analysis #7: Wooden Leg

     Complete removal of a culture is sickening. Many Native tribes in America aren't even known, they have been forgotten because no one knows their language, or they have been killed off. Wooden Leg, a Cheyenne Native, believes that someone's culture shouldn't be removed completely, but they can change and adopt new ways of life. Act of Sadness, describes this view.
     Wooden Leg starts us off with an old Indian teaching, "that it's wrong to tear loose from its place on the earth anything that may be growing there." The Native Americans had a spiritual connection to nature. They did not believe in completely removing something in nature "It may be cut off, but it should not be uprooted." Natives believed that removing grass and trees should be done in sadness and will pray for forgiveness "because of his necessities."
     Wooden Leg is not only using the removal of trees and grass to show the readers or white people that, that goes against their beliefs. He uses that as a metaphor for his own life. Wooden Leg was a pastor, trying to combine the whites and Indians together, to live peacefully with one another. Wooden Leg has also been pictured wearing a suit, a hat and holding a gun, which are items that the Natives wouldn't typically wear. While he believes that trees should not be uprooted, he feels the same way about his own culture. He's still a Native at heart but has adapted white culture.
     The removal of cultures is sickening, but it doesn't have to be that way. If the dead Native tribes learned to adapt white culture they wouldn't be alive. However that wouldn't necessarily mean their culture might survive, they would still need people speaking the language. It seems as though that's the only way to live in America, to adopt white culture.

Assertion Analysis #6: Chief Joseph is tired of fighting

    After the arrival of the colonists to America, the Native tribes started to fight for their land. Many tribes were wiped out, others surrendered to the colonists. Chief Joseph's speech "I'm tired of fighting" to General Nelson A. Miles is a very popular example of a Native American tribe surrendering to the colonists.
     Chief Joseph starts off with, "I am tired of fighting." A simple sentence, however the Natives choose their words very carefully. You instantly know what he's going to talk about by hearing that. You can also tell that the tone is of a person who's been defeated, who has nothing left to lose. "Our Chiefs are killed; Looking Glass is dead, Ta Hool Hool Shute is dead." Everyone close to him is dead. It carries an emotional appeal, making the listener, General Nelson A., hopefully understand that it's over, this man is done. Chief Joseph then begins to explain further that his tribe is freezing to death. "Hear me, my Chiefs! I am tired; my heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands I will fight no more forever." A very powerful speech, talks about how he's finished and how he doesn't want to withstand anymore wars being fought.
     Chief Joseph is a famous example of a Native tribe surrendering to the colonists. It's hard to believe that his tribe is on the verge of being nothing but a memory, but that doesn't compare to being forgotten forever, having no more of your tribe still alive. That's what has happened to the majority of the tribes in America, being totally wiped out, losing their entire culture. All of these tribes are language based so if no one speaks the language, it is as if they never existed at all.

Assertion Analysis #5: Seeker of Visions

     Every Native American tribe in America is on the verge of dying because their cultures are all language based, many Native American people are not able to speak their language therefore the culture can't survive. Although their native culture won't survive, the white culture will take over in its place. John Lame Deer, a Lakota holy man, uses satire to criticize the white peoples' culture.
     Lame Deer starts it off with, "Before our white brothers arrived to make us civilized men, we didn't have any kind of prison" implying that without the white people coming over to America and giving them prisons, the Natives would be uncivilized. However, with the introduction of prisons, that brought along delinquents, he says, "Because of this, we had no delinquents." After that he tells us other things that white people have introduced to the natives, and without those things, the natives would still be a culture that respects and trusts each other. In the last paragraph, he uses satire to poke at the fact that the white men didn't make them "civilized" because having prisons, having locks and keys, having money and private property, as well as written laws, transformed their culture of community into one where one person cares only about themselves.
     Just because they didn't have prisons, they were uncivilized even though that introduced delinquents; because they didn't use locks or keys, they were uncivilized even though they all shared with one another; because they didn't have money, "their value of a human being was not determined by his wealth." He presents all these ideas just to bring it to his point that before the white men arrived, they were a civilized society and they survived without all those things.

Socratic Seminar Online: Ta-Nahisi Coates Question #1

     This fear distorted Coates's life in multiple ways. For example, when he and his friend were in Paris, he made sure that his friend was walking in front of him, to make sure that his friend wasn't going to turn the corner and get him killed or hurt (Page 126). He is constantly afraid of his surroundings and has learned to be wary of the people and things around him. The fear of getting stopped by the Police and getting killed, the fear of being shot by a kid in school, all of that contributes to the fear that is living in America. This fear makes the American Dream dead. This fear makes you realize that the white, rich people are living on top, with all the power in the world, and the minorities are on the bottom, constantly being criticized and struggling to try and touch some of the power which they'll never be able to do. This fear, I believe, is not inevitable. It really depends on the person. I don't have to fear the police or being shot on the street because I'm Asian, I don't have the fear that black people, or even Mexican people have. Mexican people won't have the fear that Asians and black people have. Fear is inevitable, this kind of fear isn't.