Week Two, Part Two

Winnebago Trickster tales:

Rather than addressing the Winnebago trickster tales specifically right away, I will offer here some information on Native Trickster tales “in general” (even though I want to sound a general caution about making any monolithic statements about Native peoples or their beliefs). With the help of authors Richard Erdoes and Alfonso Ortiz, I will identify for you some recognizable features in Native trickster tales.

• Erdoes and Ortiz, in their American Indian Trickster Tales, point out that while in Old World legends Trickster stories play only a minor role, “in Native American folklore Trickster takes center stage” (xiii). The New World Trickster is “usually the personification of an animal—though he’s known to assume human shape if it suits his purposes” (xiii).

• There are more tales about Coyote than there are about all other Native

Tricksters put together. Other Native Tricksters are “Iktomi, the Sioux

Spider-Man,” Rabbit Boy, and Raven.

• Trickster stories have survived the onslaught of white culture, because, like the figure of Trickster himself, the stories are adaptable and possess a certain immortality that is a function of their integrality to Native story-telling (and story-telling, as Gerald Vizenor might say, is essential for Native survivance).

Concerning the tales in your Norton, it is important that we consider the transcription process. As we discussed in class:

• The tales that appear on the page in stanzas, for example the stories labeled “Felix White Sr.’s Introduction to Wakjankaja,” demonstrate the shift in transcription philosophies, from one that strives for “linguistic accuracy” to one that opts for “verse forms that attempt to convey the dramatic structure and even the performance dynamics of oral narration” (61). The “Stories About Wakjankaja” that appear on the page in a form more recognizable as what we might call “poetry” follow the latter philosophy. The stories that appear as prose, titled “From The Winnebago Trickster Cycle,” demonstrate a Boasian “commitment to linguistic accuracy” and present the transcription in “highly literal” language (61). The difference between these two textual renderings should be immediately apparent to you.

• Which transcription strategy replicates the relationship between the story-teller and audience? How? How does the language on the page of your Norton suggest different voices?

• The second version, “From The Winnebago Trickster Cycle,” contains accounts of various instances of Trickster’s misdeeds and manipulations. What kind of “hero” is Trickster?

• How do these tales describe behaviors that Euro-Americans might consider vulgar as behaviors that are “natural,” that might instruct the reader/listener about necessary behavioral codes or cultural mores? Are these tales moralistic?

• Consider the surrounding items in the Norton (John Smith and William Bradford). Analyze the inclusion of Native American Trickster tales in the anthology. How do these tales reflect very distinct differences between the cultures occupying the same lands, indeed vying for control over these lands, in the seventeenth century?

William Bradford:

A few obvious questions, inspired by the proximity of the Native American Trickster stories to Bradford’s accounts in the Norton: How is Puritan religiosity revealed in Bradford’s narrative? How does Bradford construct his arrival and immigration to the New World in religious terms? Is the religious sentiment of his text overt? Covert? Immaterial?

In Cabeza de Vaca’s narrative, he makes it clear that he experienced a transformation as a result of his interaction with new lands and landscapes, inhabited by unfamiliar people who practiced unfamiliar customs. What kind of transformation, if any, does Bradford experience?

Based on your reading, what was Bradford’s purpose in recording his experience? In terms of his writing, was Bradford more historian or artist?