Drew Hayden Taylor's Essay 'Pretty Like A White Boy'
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Drew Hayden Taylor has trouble finding his place in society because of his looks and explains this using racial humour in his essay, "Pretty like a White Boy"(1991). Taylor is half caucasion on his father's side and half ojibway on his mother's side causing him to be ojibway at heart but with fair skin and light blue eyes. This has always brought upon trouble throughout his life but he has also had great fun with it. Taylor explains both sides of his life in his essay and the perks and disadvantages of each. He jokes that he would, "make a great undercover agent for Native political organizations"(1452), because no one can tell that he is First Nation by just looking at him. Taylor uses humour throughout his essay to relieve the tension of…show more content… It is almost as if he has the best of both worlds but in reality he does not. He is looked upon as not being First Nation because he doesnt look like it. On the other hand he isn't considered "white" because of his status card. He has been living through this unbelonging state his whole life. A couple examples of this are people asking if he was actually First Nation or people making fun of First Nations people right in front of him. Either way it seems that he can never truly fit in to a group. As he grew up he was the one who was the cowboy while playing Cowboy's and Indian's. He was also an actor and never got a role as a First Nation character because he didn't "look the part." He was not only judged for looking white, he was also judged for not looking First Nation. Taylor was doing a film project one time and a little First Nation girl was convinced that he was White. "[S]he asked me if i wanted some tea. Being in a hurry, I declined the tea. She immediately smiled with victory, crying out, 'See, you're not Indian. All Indians drink tea'"(1453). Explaining who you are and where you belong in society clearly is very difficult and I believe that Taylor handles it strongly and with loads of confidence and