Presenters: Keaton Kell (International Studies, Romance Languages, Creative Writing)
Oral Presentation
Panel B: “Character Creation” Oak Room
Concurrent Session 1: 9:00-10:15am
Facilitator: Matt Nelson
The effects of narratives about Native Americans on the role of Native people and how they are viewed and how they view themselves in a modern world have remained relatively unexplored. An analysis of this role will allow us to better examine the violence and oppression faced by Native people in the United States as well as how and why that violence is perpetuated. By examining the representation of Native Americans in media, advertising, Native literature, and the news, I explore how narratives about Native people are created and how this effects both Native and non-people, which in many cases can be damaging and even dangerous to the Native people involved in these narratives. The importance of research on the connection between narratives created by a society and the results of these narratives on the minority they are about is clear. Understanding how people are effected by narratives about them sheds light not only on how we as a society can better protect minorities, but also on how we as a society can evolve past narratives in order to allow people to exist freely outside of those narratives.