Arnold Spirit for the win

              The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie was very well written and extremely fitting for an Adolescence Literature classroom. He uses many structural elements and techniques to develop the story well, and also managed to bring about many important topics among people of all ages. Alexie used cartoons, and teenage language to relate to younger audiences. As well as a plot line that contains very chaotic and over embellished stories, like many teenagers and would see their lives. At 14 years old, the most important thing is whether or not you get your crush to like you, and Arnold has that spirit.  

                Personally, I really like the fact that this book spoke about many of the hardships, and often overlooked problems within society as it relates to Indians. He talks about how poor they are, the alcoholism, the loneliness and the hopelessness of being kept in a bubble away from everybody else. By doing this, he is challenging people who are ignorant about the situation to see it from the views of a child. He also makes that child stand out but still remain extremely relatable.

                One of my other favorite thing about the author is the way he structured the piece. He made a great stylistic choice by making the book follow a school year, because many kids follow the school schedule more than the usual 12-month schedule. He also did not speak much about Native American culture and events in the piece except for the pow wows at the beginning. However, he made up for it in the end by choosing to say so much about the story of the horse who would not die, and the Grandmother’s funeral. At that point when he reveals so much about his culture, it truly shows that he is no longer feeling ashamed of where he comes from.

                Many questions and topics came to mind for me while reading this piece. Firstly, I was shocked to see that he mentioned Christianity so much because many Indian cultures are typically aboriginal. It also seemed like many of his disabilities disappeared after the first couple of chapters. While I do understand that he was meant to be relatable despite his disabilities, I was shocked that Roger, and Penelope never questioned him about his lisps, or any of his other disadvantages. I feel that putting those parts in the story would have made it more authentic. The moral of the story seems to be that adolescents should be brave in the face of adversity and hardships in life despite prejudice people, or violence around them. That is something that I think anyone of any age group can learn from.