assignment 10

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian

Why did Mr. P say, "Son, you're going to find more hope the farther and farther you walk
away from this sad, sad, sad reservation"?

Mr. P. thinks the reservation is bad for all the people. The white people did not handle the Indian
children right, but he think the Indians should ran away. The only thing the kids are thought, is to give up. That they have to give up being Indian. When Arnold stays on the reservation, they going to kill the Indian in him. It is a sad situation on the reservation because everyone is giving up. Arnold has to leave and find a place where is more hope for him.

Give 2 examples of "black comedy" in the book. Give quotes and page numbers.

The part where Roger siad “You want to hear a joke?” to the Chief.
“Sure,” he said.
“Did you know that Indians are living proof that niggers fuck buffalo?”
- Chapter 8: How To Fight Monsters

“The people at home,” I said. “A lot of them call me an apple.”
“Do they think you’re a fruit or something?” he asked.
“No, no,” I said. “They call me an apple because they think I’m red on the outside and white on the
inside.”
“Ah, so they think you’re a traitor.”
- Chapter 18: Don’t Trust Your Computer

Explain the significance of the use of drawings in the book.

The book is Arnolds diary. Drawing cartoons is a thing that Arnold loves the most to do. He does it
when he is sad or happy or angry, he evens draw a cartoon for Rowdy one time, when it was
Thanksgiving and they were in a fight. Also, the drawings makes the book funny and gives a picture
by the story Arnold tells.

Explain how Arnold is caught between two worlds and how this is connected to the title of the
book.

Arnold lives in two different worlds. One is at the reservation. The place where he lives, where his
friends live, his family. The place where he grew up. The place where he know everyone and
anything. In the reservation he is called Junior. The second world, is at school. It Is the world of the
‘’whit kids’’. Here is he called Arnold. At first, the people at school do not accept him, because he is
an ‘’Indian’’. Later, they become a kind of friends. But Arnold is caught up between two worlds. The
people at the reservation see him as one of the white people now, and the people at school see him
as an Indian. He is a little bit of both.

There are several themes in the book. Choose 3 from the list (see assignment 12) and give detailed explanations and analysis for each.

Hopes and dreams:
Everyone one the reservation gave up. They gave up there hopes and dreams and life’s. But Junior
didn’t. Sometimes Junior thinks about giving up. To just go back to the reservation and live a life like
every Native American does, and how people except how he will do to. But Junior does not give up.
He dreams about a better life, far away from the reservation. He wants to travel the world. He does
not want to end like an alcoholic person on the reservation. He has hope that he can do better.

Home:
Since Junior went to the white school, he does not have a real home anymore. The children and
teacher at his school do not respect him and treat him right, because he is an ‘’Indian’’. But people
on the reservation do not respect him either anymore. People he used to be friends with, ignores
him now. They think Junior became one of the white people now. Junior does not belong at school,
but neither at the reservation.

Education:
At the reservation is not good education. The children learn from books that even their parents had
at school. Also, on the reservation, children are thought how to be an ‘’not Indian’’. Being Indian is a
bad thing so they cannot express their culture. That is why Junior leaves the reservation and goes to
a white school. He learns a lot more there and he know it is better for his future.

How would you characterize the relationship between Rowdy and Junior at the end of the novel? Can the two ever really be best friends again? Are they part-time friends or real friends?

Rowdy and Junior used to be best friends. They used to be more like brothers. But at the moment
Junior leaves to reservation to go to school, Rowdy is so Angry at him. He thinks Junior left him so he does not want to speak with him anymore. There happened a lot things with Junior where he needs a friend for. Like the dead of his grandmother and when he falls in love on a white girl, Penelope. But
we do think that Junior and Rowdy become friends again. They have contact again and at the last
chapter, they play basketball together. If you ever had a friendship like them, you know it cannot just
go over.

While the Pow-wow sounds like fun, Arnold wants nothing to do with it. Why?

Because some of the people only go to the pow-wow for getting drunk and fight with another. Junior
hates alcohol because almost everyone who dies one the reservation, is because of alcohol.

"Ever since the Spokane Indian Reservation was founded back in 1881, nobody in my family ever lived anywhere else. We Spirits stay in one place. We are absolutely tribal. For good or bad, we don't leave one another. And now my mother and father had lost two kids to the outside world." Explain how Arnold's parents had lost two children to the outside world.

Juniors sister, Mary, left the reservation at all. She married a man and they live in an old caravan now
(later, Mary dies at a fire in the caravan). Mary did literally left the reservation to live somewhere
else. Junior still lives with his parents, but he goes to school somewhere else. He becomes ‘’one of
the white people’’. Junior does not want to be part of the reservation anymore.

Mary describes her experience eating fry bread at a restaurant in an email to Arnold. Why is it
significant that Mary can still get fry bread even though she's no longer on the Spokane
Reservation?

Mary and Junior thought that only their grandmother could make fry bread. They thought she had a
secret receipt or something. But this was because Mary and Junior never left the reservation. They
did not know what there all was in the outside world. When Mary discovers they have fry bread
somewhere out the reservation, there opens a whole new world for her.

What does it mean to "kill the Indian to save the child"?

The teacher on the reservation schools, where supposed to make children give up being Indian. The
teacher had to ‘’kill’’ the Indian culture. The songs and stories and languages and dancing. Everything
that had to do with the culture. Because, when the children aren’t Indian anymore, there is maybe
some hope for them. At the reservation there aren’t any opportunity’s. Mr. P. says to Arnold that he
has to leave the reservation because of this. Maybe he can find a life somewhere being poor and
alcoholic. Everything is better than a life on the reservation.