Storytellers and the Native American Community in Leslie Marmon Silko''s Almanac of the Dead

• Main Authors: Kevin Yang, 楊世凱
• Other Authors: Patricia Haseltine
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2005
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/7c56jx

碩士 === 靜宜大學 === 英國語文學系研究所 === 93 === Native Americans have been confronting the loss of cultural property, tradition and tribal memory since the colonization. The essence of tribal life is the sense of community that brings people together. Through stories, Leslie Marmon Silko, a storyteller of the Southwestern United States, constructs new voices on her own as she re-tells the tribal stories. In Almanac of the Dead, Silko’s communal stories about three characters, Clinton, Lecha, and Sterling, fulfill the characters’ respective ideal senses of community, a fulfillment which leads them back home. This thesis is divided into five chapters. The introductory chapter analyzes the characteristics and importance of the storyteller for Native Americans. In chapter II, I discuss how Silko weaves the story/myth together with the history to construct the character of Clinton. In Native story, history, including that of the African American, serves as part of the story. The interweaving of the myth, history and memory in the collections dissolves the boundary of the difference between Native races. Chapter III focuses on the contemporary holder of the Mayan Almanac, Lecha, who would go out of Southwest to build her idea of cosmopolitanism in the world. The world itself is a big community, and all peoples are included in this big story foretold by the almanac. Thus, story contextualizes the world and time. In Chapter IV, the focus is on Sterling’s journey as an example of the healing process of shamanism in the Native sense. For the Native, nature is part of the communal territory, as well. The destination of healing is to regain the sense of community and the ecological equilibrium of the group. The traumatized character regains the tribal identity after passing through spiritual shamanic journeys. In the last part, I conclude my discussion of the ways it is possible for the Native peoples to return to the community through the examples of the three characters above, the new version of Native history, the practice of cosmopolitanism, and shamanic healing for the Native people. The characters articulate a modest attitude toward the variety of ways community is maintained beyond tribal or personal lives.