Essay Questions

Zitkala-Sa's mother was opposed to her going to the missionary school out East. Why is this?

Zitkala-Sa is excited about the adventure that is being offered to her; the chance to pick juicy red apples straight from the tree, the chance to travel on an iron horse, the chance to meet new friends, learn new things - it all sounds very enticing to the little girl. She wants to go to attend the school especially since her brother has already gone there.

Her mother, on the other hand, is not so blinded by the offers that are being made to her daughter. She has already had her son taken from her by these missionaries, and has not seen him since he left to attend the school that they now want to take Zitkala-Sa off to. She knows that life out East with paleface will not be all shiny red apples and adventure; she knows that the missionaries are trying to wipe out the Native American race systematically and to turn them into Europeanized children. She already feels that so much of her heritage and the things that her ancestors stood for has been taken away by paleface; she does not want her daughter to be taken from her as well.

What was the purpose of the missionary school?

The purpose of the missionary school was to force all traces of their Native American heritage and culture out of the children attending and to turn them into European-Americans. They knew that they were not allowed to forcibly remove children from their homes and they also knew that offering a realistic picture of what their lives were about to be like at the school would never attract or intrigue any of the children. This is why they painted a less than realistic picture when persuading the children to leave the tribe and travel east.

Once the children were at the school they realized too late how their lives were going to unfold. The point of the school was to wipe away all traces of the tribal heritage from the children. They were no longer allowed to wear their loose dresses and moccasins; these were replaced by a close fitting, stif and scratchy uniform. The girls also had their long hair forcibly cut off, which is demeaning and traditionally has been a method of Catholicism, scaring them with tales of the devil into believing everything that the missionaries told them. The missionaries then intended for the children to graduate school and return to their tribes, and to incite change in them in the same way.

How do the tribes pass down their wisdom and their stories to the next generation?

The tribe use many different ways to pass their stories down to the next generation, and one of Zitkala-Sa's favorite of learning these stories and traditions is by listening to her "legends" - the elders of the tribe; one of her most treasured memories is of her excitement when the elders would come to the family wigwam for dinner, and they would talk of the spirits, and of the ways in which things had been done in days gone by. They would teach whilst entertaining, and they were extremely respected by the tribe. Zitkala-Sa would go to sleep at night thinking about the stories she had heard and retelling the stories of her revered elders before she went to bed.

Arts and crafts also pass down traditions through the generations. Zitkala-Sa tells of the beadwork that she was learning how to do, and also tells the reader that her mother and aunt were the ones who were passing this talent on to her. Each complex beadwork tells a different traditional story, and the colors used are extremely important. In this way, each generation learns from the generations that have gone before them, they tell a story with the beadwork but they also keep the art of beadwork alive in of itself as well.