Myth, Metaphor, and Meaning in "The Boy Who Could Not Understand": A Study of Seneca Auto-Criticism

Autor/in	Vest, Jay Hansford C.
Titel	Myth, Metaphor, and Meaning in "The Boy Who Could Not Understand": A Study of Seneca Auto-Criticism
Quelle	In: American Indian Culture and Research Journal, 30 (2006) 4, S.41-62 (22 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0161-6463
Schlagwörter	Stellungnahme; Tales; Ecology; Criticism; Folk Culture; Boarding Schools; Figurative Language; American Indians; Oral Tradition; Mythology; Personal Narratives + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Erzählung; Ökologie; Kritik; Boarding school; Internat; American Indian; Indianer; Oral history; Mündliche Überlieferung; Mythologie; Erlebniserzählung
Abstract	In this article, the author proposes to offer the narrative "The Boy Who Could Not Understand" for review and criticism as a manifestation of Native philosophical organicism. It is his contention that the tale represents a form of Native auto-criticism resulting from experiential encounters with youth who had returned from white boarding schools. In this tale, the mythmakers recognize the literal positivism characteristic of Western education, and they react to it with an infusion of obvious nature-based metaphors designed to generate an organic understanding of word, language, and tradition characteristic of their oral heritage. When articulating this assessment, the author offers a review of Arthur Caswell Parker's (1881-1955) history, study, and critique of Western folklore methodologies used in the study of Native American oral narratives. Parker's critique supplies an intrinsic, in other words Native-derived, criticism of the folklore methodology of his day, and it is an invaluable beginning in considering the problem of modern criticisms of Native oralcy. He also offers a brief review of the positivistic problem, through postmodern literary considerations, while attending both early historical and recent examples of a traditional Native-based organicism. In this organic-based context, nature-based metaphors and organic figures of speech referring to natural phenomena are the dominant modes of expression. In focusing on this approach, he is guided by the philosophies of organicism characteristic of philosopher Alfred North Whitehead and those of the deep ecology movement. (Contains 81 notes.) (ERIC).
Anmerkungen	American Indian Studies Center at UCLA. 3220 Campbell Hall, Box 951548, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1548. Tel: 310-825-7315; Fax: 310-206-7060; e-mail: sales@aisc.ucla.edu; Web site: http://www.books.aisc.ucla.edu/aicrj.html
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2017/4/10