A Glimpse of American Indian Writing

I found the following sentences in an article I had to read for my Eng. 3510 class. The article is called, Rhetorical Sovereignty: What Do American Indians Want From Writing? by Scott Richard Lyons. Overall, this article discusses the discourse of writing from an American Indian point of view; what it was like to learn how to write for American Indians after "The White Men" came to America and took over the land. The following sentences consist of both a quote from Standing Bear, A Native American whoexplains what it was like for Native Americans to become "civilized" and educated, and an explanation from Lyons who puts the "new technology" of writing into perspective and how American Indians would have to change everything they knew about language and representation of symbols:

"'Although we were yet wearing our Indian clothes...we were marched into a school room, where we were each given a pencil and slate. We were seated at single desks. We soon discovered that the pencils made marks on the slate' (Sioux 136.) Pulling thier blankets over thier heads to conceal both slate and the marks they would make upon them, a child's act of modestly, the children's first impulse was to draw scenes from their recently departed home life- 'a man on a pony chasing a buffalo, or a boy shooting birds in a tree, or it might be one of our Indian games-' and when finished, 'we dropped our blankets down on the seat and marched up to the teacher with our slates to show what we had drawn' (Sioux 136). Picture these children withdrawing into their blankets with a curious new technology, concealing thier texts from each other and the teacher until just the right moment, then emerging fromt thier blankets proud and eager to share the fruits of thier labor. They were, at least until this point, the same children, and the marks they made were earnest representations of their lives. Shortly, thereafter, however, this same technology would be used to change them..." (Lyons, 1128).

I like this whole passage and the ones following it in the article, because Lyons does a great job in using his reasearch and information to help us understand how the Native Americans' world was completely turned upside down and uses Standing Bears voice to help convey how learning to become "civilized" and educated was more of a nightmare to him and his people than it was anything else. I also like Lyons use of quotes to really capture the point he is trying to make on how Rhetorical Sovereginty is one: interpreted completely different today than it was in the past, and two: was used as a way to force Indians to make treaties with the "White Men" yet, later found the "White Men" betrayed everything they had agreed to. Lyons also uses running style and hypotaxis to make his writing concise and vivid, as well as, helping readers to understand the children's understanding of writing before they were stripped of their identify and made "educated". It is interesting to see how the discourse of writing has been forced upon Native Americans and having an education was not something they could appreciate in thier situation. Therefore, this piece really made me think about how I view writing and how it affects people all over the world. It also makes me fell sorry for the American Indians to be seen as "animals" so to speak, and be forced to live, speak, and wright the "right" way according the "White Men", our ancestors. It's kind of emotional and hearbreaking.