Tregre: Week 5, Pow Wow Highway and "Saint Marie"

The Trail of Tears

Pow Wow Highway and "Saint Marie" allowed the audience to deal with the psychological effects of Native American's interaction with Whites during a suppressed time. Each character faces different types of psychological, economic, and social genocides. Whether it was the killing of their spirit, or being socially suppressed, this was genocide if it exterminated the essence of a culture or race. Genocide was an attack against the spirit and an effort to rid the world of people who were deemed “lesser.” Each person has their own struggle and journey in this movie and short story. Their hardships made them notable long after the movie and story was over. 

        

In Pow Wow Highway, Buddy Red Bow seems to be the person who always has to be the tough man and leader in order to psychologically cope with his Native American Genocide. Genocide is something that does not have to be killing, it can also mean destroying a race by psychological, economical, or political ways. In this case, Americans, such as the cops, were trying to set up the Native Americans. Buddy Red Bow chooses to fight this and has a lot of angry outbursts. He sees the unjust situation and wants to find a solution. At many points it seems that his outbursts are not necessary, however, he is the only family member who can help his family and be strong enough to rise against adversity. He is angry at the situation and feels helpless, so this is his front. However, violence must not be met with violence. Buddy Red Bow must gain wisdom and respect in order to help their tribe, the Cheyennes, exist and not be endangered or made extinct by the Whites.

On the opposite end of the spectrum is, Philbert Bono. He is easygoing and wants to start his journey to become a warrior. He believes in mysticism, meditation, and is stuck making the journey with Buddy Red Bow to get his sister out of jail. He has faith unlike Buddy Red Bow. His wisdom and meditations show Buddy Red Bow that his way was not the right way to go. He was just as wrong as the Whites who were trying to eliminate their race, destroy their economy, and ruin their tribe.

These two characters in Pow Wow show two different reactions of an attempted genocide. Though it was not outright like the Holocaust, it was obvious that they were not welcome there. Instead of being angry and fighting back, Red Bow learned that the problems and system rigged against the Native Americans were not all the white man’s fault. Blaming them would not help the situation or make him a better person, in turn it was time to take his eyes off of the suppression and understand himself and his place in the world. Empowerment of the self and honoring the Cheyennes was the best way to beat this attempted genocide. The White man wanted to split up their families, deny them of their religion and heritage, and even their economic means. In order to stop this, they had to be strong and seek justice, not revenge. One cannot go back in time, and one cannot create an ideal society, which were the two views of Bono and Red Bow. It was important for a middle ground to be taken to accept reality and make a change to fight off the oppression.

In “Saint Marie,” religion is highly observed. Native Americans were not even accepted in the religious world. The girl, Marie, was abused by Sister Leopolda since she was a Native American. Leopolda oppressed Marie and would stick her hands in the oven or poor hot water on her. This was an attempt at psychological genocide. Leopolda wanted to hurt Marie and prove to her, her low worth. However, when she accidently stabs Marie in the wrong spot, they believe her to be a Saint. This story showed how Indian children were sent to schools and other communities in order to disintegrate their customs and take away their heritage for a life of poverty. This was economic genocide. By taking them to these places and raising these children as inferior and abusing them, it would eventually white out the Native American culture and replace it with impoverished people.

These ways that the Native Americans were oppressed all had one main goal, elimination of this culture. Although this was not as severe as the Holocaust, the Whites just went about it in a more indirect, meticulous way. Regardless, it would all eventually have the same result. These characters were able to be spared, however, they were only fairytales.