A Study On Contemporary Native American Fiction In The Perspective Of Ecocriticism

The contemporary ecocriticism, which can be traced back to thebackground of ecological crisis that human beings as well as the whole world areobliged to confront, purports to study the relationship between literature andenvironment and enlightens people to realize the importance of the harmony andbalance between human beings and the nature. What the contemporary ecologicmovement needs to focus upon is the deep root of environment crisis in order torealize the intimate and important relationship of mutual dependence between humanbeings and the environment. Therefore, the traditional aesthetic ideas of commonlyrecognized dualities between the subjective and the objective, the active and thepassive must be abandoned. Instead, they should be unitized to create the pleasantand beautiful feelings in oneness and benefit from each other. The scholars involvedin writing, criticism and teaching careers as creative mediators between literature andthe biosphere need to undertake the tasks, including the encouragement, discovery,training, and development of creative biospheric apperceptions, attitudes, and actions.Struggling in the main culture that is overwhelmed with the heroic conquests aspositive individualism in which the Native Americans are always “the children ofnature” instead of “the men of letters”, their works have been included in Americanliterary canons no earlier than forty years ago for two reasons: one is theireco-systemic and non-anthropocentric perspective; the other is their performative andnon-textual mode of presentation. They have created many mythological stories ofrecovery and survival based on communities, in which the Sacred Hoop, symbolizing the perfect state of harmony and balance between human beings and the nature,becomes the spiritual pillar for Native Americans to defeat miseries, face the lifeoptimistically and fulfill their recovery. It represents their unique understanding ofspace-time cycles and the kinship.The metaphysical contemplation of Martin Heidegger—the Geviert of sky, earth,God and human representing respectively nature, belief and mortal human—is theideological basis of contemporary deep ecology in which the ecological holismpreserves the inseparable sky and earth, the God and the human who inhabit in thisworld in unity. He intends to guide the people with neither natural nor spiritualhomes to keep in harmony with all of the things in this world. Leslie Silko attemptsto analyze in Ceremony the Native Americans’ hardships and persistent vitality in theAmerican social life of the second half of the20thcentury. She devotes greater effortsto explore the liveliness of Indian culture embedded in the veteran’s recovery andreturn to the community by telling Tayo’s story. This liveliness originates fromNative people’s firm belief in the Geviert of sky, earth, God and human all along intheir history.Taking themselves as representatives and medium, the ecofeminists arousepeople’s vigilance to the existence of any unfair relationship to be changed in bothnatural and social lives. Native American writers find the healing power from thefemale shamans and warriors according to their woman tradition to reestablish thecentral position of Indian women in the tribal culture. This open context goes inaccordance with ecofeminism when facing the ecological crisis of modern world alltogether. Taking Mother Earth as an archetype, Paula Gunn Allen and James Welchboth reveal and interpret the tribal tradition of woman principle in their works—TheWoman Who Owned the Shadows and Winter in the Blood respectively. They try todiscover how the Natives of today get the rebirth in the baptism of Mother Earth toescape away from the spiritual dilemma caused by the materialization andindustrialization.The loss of the land that bears the tribal and familial histories and the radicalchange of the surrounding environment have done the Natives a severe emotionalinjury and caused their identity crisis. Due to this recognition, the Native American writers like to tell the survival stories of returning to home and re-understanding thekinship between the tribesmen and the nature. Louise Erdrich expresses her intensefeeling towards the reservations of the Native Americans by describing theirlandscape and environment in Love Medicine. Such intense feeling comes from herknowledge of the Indian history, as well as her deep understanding of the traditionalIndian spirituality which praises highly of the kindred intimacy between the humanbeing and the land. This happens to hold the same view with the eco-critical trend oftoday. Scott Momaday, on the other hand, advocates the traditional Indian culture bystory-telling in The Way to Rainy Mountain and House Made of Dawn, which is alsoa process of appreciating the beauty of the homeland. This is a remarkable exampleto understand the kinship between the people and their land praised highly intraditional Indian spirituality. Only when the nature is no longer the setting of stories,but the guide to people’s realization of his or her identity, history and culture, can thepeople finally understand the sense of place and get access to the place of happiness.Since food is one of the dominant conditions for survival, the harmoniousrelation and mutual dependence between animals and human beings manifest fullythe significant influence of the Native traditional culture on the ecological condition.The popular trickster stories among tribes-people are the most obvious expression oftheir culture emblem to reveal their animal ethics. Their persistence in theconnectedness and mutual benefits of the whole world as a principle and their firmbelief in tricksters have educated and changed the people. The optimistic tricksters incontemporary Native American novels offer readers a unique perspective tounderstand the survival of self accompanied with the natural world. Holding fast tothe traditional narration, the contemporary Native American writers as LouiseErdrich, Gerald Vizenor and Thomas King all write about the tricksters as themediators between the human being and the animals, the culture and the nature tocorrect mistakes and educate readers about the traditional sense of values.Mainly featured of being de-anthropocentric, ecological holism has been set asthe purpose of the contemporary ecocritical practice, whereas this is the ancientwisdom practiced and handed down in generations for the North Native Americans.When the western philosophers are still meditating and arguing for the endless streams of dualities, the North Native Americans are expressing and practicing theirworld view and spirituality on their own, constructing a harmonious Sacred Hoop ofthe coexistence of the human being and the nature. The mythologies and tales createdand passed down by ancestors have been the archetype for the contemporary Nativewriters to study and refer to. Like the traditional story-tellers, they inherit and spreadthe ancient ideas in their ritualized and mystified narration within a modern context.They treat the people and the whole world as a connected web, whereas any singlebroken string would cause the tilting and damage of the whole. Such belief helpseach individual and the whole tribe to enhance the lasting harmony with the naturalworld. The ecological wisdom of complying with the nature, no doubt, hasconsiderable realistic significance to defuse the present crisis of the global ecology.