Distance Student Question 4

Quite a few years ago, I took a cultural anthropology class at UHCL. The instructor in that course said that before we settled in to read about somebody else’s life, we should always attempt to find out who funded the ethnography we were about to read. By doing so, we would be more likely to get an idea of what tone the work would take and what the agenda might be for the piece. I’ve always remembered that, and I always try to determine who wrote something, why they wrote it, and who they wrote it for, especially when I’m reading the story of someone else’s life.

As I was reading Appendix 2 to Black Elk Speaks, I noticed that the writer says that Neihardt "suppressed unnecessary details, altered awkward expressions and introduced a tone of reverence and solemnity, transmuting the oral narrative into literature" (215). After I read that, I began to wonder what effect the suppressions and change of tone had on Black Elk’s story. I also began to wonder what happens to a story when you change it from an oral tradition to a written one.

Black Elk converted to Christianity in the early 1900’s, some years before Neihardt took down his story. Does knowing this change your view of Black Elk as a Native American holy man? Does knowing that Neihardt suppressed that information change your view of the story in any way?

Researching the author and their motives for a work of literature prior to reading is certainly valuable advice. In the case of Black Elk Speaks I felt that, although we were privy to a great deal of the American Indian lifestyle, there was still a great deal that was left out. I also feel that, even if it were there in black and white on paper, we still could not grasp the true meaning of it. At least not as it would have been for a true American Indian living through such a horrendous episode in history.

There are both pros and cons to this situation. One pro is the fact that Neihardt certainly respects Black Elk and wants to deliver his story as accurately as possible. Yet the cons to this are the fact that he isn't actually hearing it first hand. Black Elk only speaks Sioux. He relates his story in Sioux to an interpreter (Black Elk's son Ben), who is recorded through the shorthand of Enid Neihardt (the author's daughter), that Neihardt deciphers later onto paper (Preface xix). Considering the path the oral narrative takes to get onto paper, I have no doubt a great deal is lost in the process.

I don't feel that Black Elk becoming a Christian changes my view of him. He and all the American Indians seem extremely spiritual, and the fact that he converts to a religion he had never been exposed to in the past doesn't change his story for me. I agree with Neihardt in keeping that information out of the narrative. I think to include it would make him seem like he's adopting the White man's ways-that's not the image we form of Black Elk when reading his life story, and it's certainly not one I want to leave with.

Hi Becky. As always, you raise some interesting issues. I do elements of the story that seemed awfully close to Christianity--too close to be any coincidence in my opinion. So I do feel that Christian influence as I read. For me, personally, (and I somehow fell that my personal perspective is about the only way I can answer this) it does not change my view of Black Elk as a Native American holy man. Perhaps some would see it as betraying his Native American culture. Black Elk's religion is very personal to him, and however he handled his own faith is not something in itself that changes how I feel about him. But I'm also aware that I'm coming from a very liberal Christian perspective as a member of a dominant culture.

I also find the suppression information by Neihardt interesting. You mention changes by Neihardt to introduce a tone of reverence and solemnity, and I can't help but presume that has major significance. Any such change in tone by someone on behalf of another is going to change the piece dramatically. I suspect audience consideration is a factor here. Perhaps Neihardt had intentions of helping Black Elk appeal to an audience of the dominant culture (white culture), and he knows a change in tone is necessary to reach that intended audience. So he makes those changes in tone to "help" Black Elk with that audience. I think perhaps you see those changes for audience consideration as well in the Classic Slave Narratives. Some of those narratives are modified for that same tone of reverence and solemnity.

As to why the conversion to Christianity is not revealed, perhaps speaking of such conversion would present too much of a sense of leaving the Native American culture and integrating into the white culture--something both a white audience and the Native American culture would feel uneasy about. Sure the dominant people say they want the Native Americans converted to Christianity, but they still want them isolated in their own society. Addressing a shared religion might be a little much to bring to their attention in the midst of all the bloody battles. Bringing out a shared religion would make the Native Americans a little to similar for comfort.

I hope I'm making some sense. See what you think.

Tara

Hey Becky,

Regarding Black Elk, I feel that any time we address any piece of literature, it is our job to look at any and all potential variables and ulterior motives that may (or may not) have an impact on the text. Skepticism is part of our job. We must take into account anything that may affect on our interpretation. How we interpret a text bears directly on the substance of meaning we derive from it. In the case of Black Elk, knowing about his conversion to Christianity makes his final visions much easier to interpret. The correlations to Christianity are much easier to understand when we can separate them from Native American myth. And perhaps this was Black Elk's way of synthesizing his native religion with his "new" religion.

The layers of translators, stenographers, writers and editors are bound to have had some effect on the text, but in this case were unavoidable. In a certain sense, we are truly lucky to even have (please excuse the split infinitive) the text to interpret, and for that we should applaud Neihardt for his tenacity in attaining it for us. I have to agree with Vine Deloria, Jr., in his forward, when he questions the possibility of Neihardt's "intrusions" and their possible effects on the text: "Can it matter? [...] That it speaks to us with simple and compelling language about an aspect of human experience and encourages us to emphasize the best that dwells within us is sufficent" (xvi-xvii). We will each take from each text what we choose to be important and apply it accordingly.

Oral to written? Of course the text will undergo change. We cannot expect written language to ever have (there I go again) the same impact that a true storyteller can have on us. Would that we could have Homer tell us The Iliad or the Odyssey. How much more wonderful it would be.

David Miller

Becky,

I suspect that much could have been lost in the translation from the oral to the written (from Black Elk to his son, to his daughter to Neihardt), but there is no means to be certain as to what extent Black Elk's words were changed. Neihardt readily admits to "suppress[ing] unnecessary details, alter[ing] awkward expressions and introduc[ing] a tone of reverence and solemnity, transmuting the oral narrative into literature" (215). Black Elk Speaks was written in the 1930s when the dominant culture was not ready for a graphic (bloody, gory), brutal depiction of how the white man remedied the Indian "situation" such as Cormac McCarthy reveals in Blood Meridian written in the 1980s. In addition, history pertaining to the American Indians was not included in history textbooks, and Indians were portrayed in movies and books as bloody savages who were out to kill European immigrants for no valid reason. If Neihardt had not toned down Black Elk Speaks, many members of the dominant culture would perhaps have been offended, and the book might not have been published. Today, however, the dominate culture is finally realizing that minorities do have a voice and that their history is essential for understanding and accepting minority cultures. This is the reason that Black Elk Speaks is important even if Neihardt made changes. Black Elk Speaks gives us valuable information and insight into a society that the majority of the dominate culture does not comprehend; therefore, the footnotes and explanations in brackets that Neihardt included are very useful.

The fact that Black Elk converted to Christianity has no bearing on my reaction to the book. Black Elk Speaks is not only a biography of Black Elk; it is the story of his tribe and the other Indian tribes that he was familiar with. The tale ends when he is finally forced onto a reservation, and Black Elk did not become Christian until after he was coerced to live in the dominate culture's world. He foremost was an Indian with his Indian heritage and traditions.

Linda

Hi Class,

Thanks to those of you who answered Question 4. There were some interesting answers that really made me think. Most people who answered think that changing from oral to written tradition would obviously have made a difference to the story. As Jamie said, the written word simply isn’t sufficient to convey the meaning—there was so much of American Indian life that was left out—and even if we could put it all down "in black and white on paper, we still could not grasp the true meaning of Black Elk’s experience." That observation is very important because, not only does it take into account the way the text was written, it brings our own interpretations into play as well. Our imaginations cannot do justice to someone else’s life experience. Philonis has pointed out that in an oral tradition, as the story moved from storyteller to storyteller, there would have been slight changes that occurred. I would like to suggest that perhaps these changes would have been helpful in bringing out new meanings in the story. These changes wouldn’t have been like changes on paper. The hearer would have heard these stories over and over, would have known when changes were made, and the variations would have added dimension.

Most everyone commented on the changes that were necessarily made in the written text because of translators, transcribers, and the writer. Tara points out that Neihardt may have had to change the tone of the story to appeal to a particular audience. That is true, but then I think the question becomes who was the audience and why did redactions need to be made in order to appeal to that audience? On the question of Black Elk’s conversion to Christianity, Jamie feels that such an addition would only serve to mar our picture of Black Elk. But both David and Philonis point out that people often keep elements of more than one religion, and David says that knowing about Black Elk’s conversion "makes his final visions much easier to interpret." Tara wonders if the information was left out because it might make both Native Americans and the dominant culture uneasy. I’ve been struggling with this question ever since I wrote it. The language for what I want to ask just won’t come to me. The best I’ve been able to do follows:

I think that knowing that Black Elk converted to Christianity (as well as knowing that Neihardt altered the text in other ways) is important to attempting to understand who Black Elk was. Knowing about some of the things that were changed does affect my view of him, but not in a negative way. I think it expands my view of him and his people. If he did convert to Christianity, I think it is important to question why he did it—what experience did he have, what factors were weighing on him, etc. If we don’t think it is important to know what has been left out or changed in Black Elk Speaks, why not? Do we just cut off that part of the story and pretend it doesn’t exist so that we can be more comfortable? What do you think?

P.S. I just received Linda’s comments after I had finished writing this. Her points about the necessity of changing the tone, etc. to fit the audience go along with Tara’s comments on audience. Linda brings up the fact that bloody movies about Indians were popular during the 30’s. (When we were reading the book, I was thinking about what was going on during the 30’s, too, and the movies that came to my mind were the Lone Ranger and Tonto—weren’t those movies out in the 30’s?) But Linda’s point is very well made that Indians were portrayed as blood thirsty and "out to kill European immigrants for no valid reason" and that a novel that showed a valid reason might not have been published. Although people in the 30’s may not have been ready to receive a novel that had not been toned down, I hope we are more receptive to it, and it seems important to me that we explore every way the novel was changed in order to understand more fully exactly what happened. Linda, your comment about Black Elk not becoming a Christian "until after he was coerced to live in the dominant culture’s world" is the point I was thinking of when I wrote the question. Neihardt chose to leave that fact out, and while he may have had to make editorial decisions for his audience in the 30’s, I’m thinking that now we need to explore those decisions to get a clearer picture of Black Elk and his heritage.

Thanks for your comments. If anyone wants to respond to this monstrosity of words, feel free. I may not answer for a while, since I have a paper due in my other class, but eventually I will answer.

Becky