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Model Midterm1 answers 2018 Web Highlights: review previous student answers re minorities and / or American Indians Index to Web Highlights Models 2018 |
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Justin Murphy
Dominant Culture = Suppressive Actions
A common idea throughout American History is the idea of the dominant
culture. The dominant culture includes one main group, when discussing history:
white men. These white men believed that everything was theirs, and thus coined
the term “manifest destiny” to finish what Andrew Jackson started with the Trail
of Tears. When reviewing model assignments, three assignments really stood out
to me when thinking about the dominant culture—Amber Boone’s research proposal,
Felicia Coglianese’s research post number 2, and Ryan Harold’s final exam essay.
In Amber Boone’s research proposal from 2016’s American Immigrant class,
she discusses how she wants to research into the idea of dominant culture. She
discusses how she wants to try and define the dominant culture besides
“whiteness” as this term can be unfair to people of that skin color. Boone seems
to walk a fine line here, as she questions an established ideal of whiteness
being associated with the dominant culture. I would argue against Boone by
saying that in terms of American History, the dominant culture HAS always been
the white man. However, I would agree with her that it is unfair to just
associate a full group of people with one term. Boone’s proposal brought forth
the idea of fairness to my head. Not only do we need to be fair in labeling the
suppressed culture, but also in labeling the dominant culture.
Felicia Coglianese’s research post serves as a perfect example for how
the dominant culture has suppressed those around them, and how that translates
over into today’s society. In her post, she talks about learning about Native
American culture, and how we can incorporate that into educational curriculum.
She mentions her personal experience: how she never learned about Native
American culture in school other than what they wore, and that we pushed them
out of their land. She calls for an education of Native American culture and
history in curriculum to help define this gray area. Her post sticks out to me
as it shows that the dominant culture continues to suppress Native Americans in
today’s society. While it isn’t necessarily through physical actions like it was
in the 1800s, it is through a lack of education on their history. This is
something that happens to a lot of minority groups: their education does not
include their culture. The term “history is written by the victors” has never
been more prevalent.
Ryan Harold’s final exam essay touches on the minority culture in
literature, and what it means for them to be represented. When he talks about
the Native Americans, he mentions that their “American dream” is realistically
an “American nightmare.” When I read this, I finally found a term to place to
the Native American experience. Having learned about Native American history a
little bit through American History, I always felt horrible for the Native
American peoples. They had everything taken from them and were forced to
assimilate to American culture. If they wanted to maintain their ways, they were
then forced onto reservations. Ryan’s paper shows that the dominant culture has
taken the ability away from Native Americans to live their American dream. He
also mentions how Native American literature is very pessimistic, which makes a
lot of sense to me. Ryan showed me that the dominant culture uses suppressive
actions.
All three of these assignments show how the dominant culture has
historically taken over the voice of Native Americans through suppressive
actions. I wonder what Ryan and Felicia would say to Amber’s research proposal;
do they agree with her in terms of labeling or not? I also wonder how Amber
finished her research; did she end up finding a better term/way to characterize
the dominant culture? All three of these assignments show that minority
literature is important because it is representative of a culture and a history.
