Smoke Signals

Smoke Signals Essay

Jake Weese

           Smoke Signals showed Indian Culture in both a positive and negative way through the way the characters dealt with native history and stereotypes as well.. Our Main characters are Thomas and Victor, 2 Native American's who live on a reservation in Idaho. When Victor's dad is found dead in Phoenix, the two embark on a journey to originally just go claim the body and the stuff but it ends up being more than that in the end.  

         Our Characters have to deal with a lot of stereotypes and struggles with Native History. Victor even tells Thomas that he doesn't act like a true native and asks him how many times he'd seen "Dances With Wolves". Even Victor himself ends up acting like a stereotype later on When he explains to Thomas what it's like to truly be a native "Don't Smile, you need to look tough, be stoic Thomas, act like you've just killed a buffalo." This line is shown later to be false when Thomas tells Victor that their tribe weren't buffalo hunters but fishermen. This last example also helps to show that even the boys don't know they're own tribal/native history as well as being a stereotype since the boys assume every tribe killed buffalo. Later the Boys talk about how the Cowboys always seem to win, but they don't base this on facts, they base it on John Wayne movies, another stereotype.   

Our Characters find power and meaning through their history and culture as natives. The Boys talk fondly of Fyrare bread a native tradition which while not being apart of their tribe, it is still a native dish that they find as apart of their cultural traditions. An example of finding power through the Native culture is Thomas's ability to tell stories which help the boys out in the long run for Thomas uses his ability like many other natives to get things such as the boys getting a ride in the opening or later it's how Victor learns more about his dad through his Friend who lives in Phoenix which wouldn't have been possible to get that info about the dad had it not been for Thomas doing a story swap where he told a story and the friend told a story in return. Victor finds meaning in the symbolic cutting of his long hair to short, He does it to transition many things such as his new understanding for his dad, his maturing into a man and a fresh start as well now that the weight has been lifted of why his dad left/wanted to leave. 

   Smoke Signals was an accurate portrayal of a group that is highly romanticized in pop culture past and present and they show this very nicely through it's characters struggle at first to understand what it means to be native as they base most of their ideas and such through stereotypes, while later they understand what it means and even mix the modern with the tradition in a way.