Victora Lena Manyarrows, “Lakota Sister / Cherokee Mother,” UA 286-287.

Reader: Starr Haun

Respondent: Mary Kay Clements

Biographical Information:

            Victora Lena Manyarrows was born on April 1956 in North Dakota of Tsalagia, Eastern Cherokee and Italian ancestry.   In 1993, she received her Master's Degree in Social work.  She became a photographer and a writer; her work predominately reflects her American Indian, feminist and lesbian background, but to a lesser degree it also reflects her other life experiences.  Ms. Manyarrows proclaimed, "For me, writing and visual art has always been a vehicle for political and personal change, as well as spiritual exploration and expression."  Although her pieces give herself a voice, she also hopes to encourage others to speak out as well.

            Her work has been in various publications, including "Without Discovery: A Native Response to Columbus," "Piece of My Heart," and "Voices of Identity, Rage and Deliverance."  Her photographs were on exhibit in "The Dynamics of Color" in San Francisco in 1989 and in "Forbidden Subjects: Self-Portraits by Lesbian Artists."

Literary Objectives:

Objective 3b. Native American Indian alternative narrative: "Loss and Survival"

            The mother is trying to leave the past behind by attempting to become a modern woman.  The daughter wants to go back to her roots and continue the traditions of her people so their culture will continue on.  The mother could be symbolic of those who give up too easily, or maybe she sees adapting as a means of survival.  The daughter wants to survive as well, but remains strong to her ancestry.

Objective 4.  Assimilation or resistance

            The mother has chosen to assimilate like immigrants have done.  The daughter wants to resist the ways of the dominant culture.

Interpretation From Previous Student:

            In 2004, Sherry Mann wrote, "This poem is about a minority relationship between a mother and a daughter in conflict based on their decision to either resist or assimilate. The daughter wants to resist the dominant culture and appreciate that she is a mountain woman from the east and the south. The mother assimilates to the dominant culture, the modern culture. She doesn’t want to connect with her history. The daughter feels isolated because the mother denies her as her daughter. The mother wants to move on to become a part of the modern culture and continue to deny her heritage and culture."

My Personal Interpretation:

            The mother tells many false creation stories to the narrator jokingly implying she can't possibly be her daughter because the two of them are so different.  The mother’s generational position is chronologically closer to ancient ancestors than her daughter, but the daughter connects more to them through her lifestyle.  I find it interesting the mother took on a role more closely linked to modern times, and the daughter is the one with a traditional attitude.   

 I think the narrator was pointing out a situation in which most of us are familiar with because we don't live or think exactly as our parents do.  When a child is young, he or she mimics parental figures, so it comes as a shock to parents when the child later becomes an individual with opposing views.

            Given Ms. Manyarrow's lesbian activist background, I suspect an underlying theme is how parents don't identify with their child when it turns out he or she is a homosexual.  Often times, a heterosexual parent can’t fathom how a homosexual child has come about from his or her “straight” upbringing, then concludes it is a temporary condition and insists he or she is “lost.”   The narrator’s close ties to her ancestry could be symbolic of her innate desires.

Questions:

1.  Is this poem about individualism or is the narrator speaking out about cultural resistance?  Could it be both?  What clues in the text and title support your argument?

2.  When talking about her mother's contempt for her own culture and her ambitions to modernize herself, the last sentence says, "that no one could understand."  Who is the narrator referring to when she says "no one?"  What effect does that have on the rest of the poem?

3.  Is one a cultural traitor for choosing to assimilate with the dominant society, like the mother did, rather than staying true to his or her roots?

Bibliography:

http://www.cla.purdue.edu/WAAW/Corinne/Manyarrows.htm