The Absolutely True Diary Of Part Time Indian Analysis

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Junior is a Native American teenager who lives on a reservation. Everyone who surrounds him is either a drunk, or someone who never finished their education. He’s grown accustomed to all the stereotypes that come with being Native American. That he’ll never graduate high school or college and he’ll just become a poor drunkard who lives on the rez his whole life. In the book, The Absolutely True Diary of Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie, a boy named Arnold, aka Junior goes through many obstacles in order to become the kind of person that he wants to be, and not be defined by the people whom he’s surrounded by. One of these obstacles is overcoming his fears and attending Reardan High School, a school that is full of white kids who basically…show more content…
“Do I have to tell you that I was absolutely sick with fear? I vomited four times that day. [...] As we got off the bus and walked toward the gym, I could hear the crowd going crazy inside. They were chanting something. I couldn’t make it out. And then I could. The rez basketball fans were chanting, “Ar-nold sucks! Ar-nold sucks! Ar-nold sucks!” [...] Coach looked back at me. “Are you okay?” he asked. “No,” I said. “You don’t have to play this one,” he said. “Yes, I do, I said.” Arnold determination to do well in the game and show up his old friends who thinks he’s a traitor is something that we had almost never seen from him before; strength. He takes all of this in stride, despite his nervousness, and he plays that game as well as he possibly could, to not only prove himself to the people from the reservation, but to himself as well. He overcame something that if he was back on the reservation, he might not have even had the courage to do. Face his ex- best friend in a basketball game? He’d pass. But Reardan changed him for the better and getting through a semester at Reardan taught him that he can do
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