the absolutely true diary of a part time indian essay

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

By sherman alexie, the absolutely true diary of a part-time indian literary elements.

Young Adult

Setting and Context

Early 2000's in Washington State - on and around the Spokane Indian Reservation

Narrator and Point of View

Junior is the narrator. The story is told from his first person point of view as the novel is written in the form of a personal diary.

Tone and Mood

The mood of the novel is light-hearted, as Junior is an awkward but humorously honest fourteen-year-old boy writing in his diary. At its core, this is a coming-of-age novel with a dramatic narrative arc. Because of this, Absolutely True Diary resonates with a universal audience. It is also educational for those who are unfamiliar with Indian culture and the problems currently facing people who live on reservations in the United States.

Protagonist and Antagonist

Junior is the protagonist. Rowdy, Roger, Mr. Dodge, and the Indians on the reservation are all antagonists at some point in the story; the most prominent antagonistic forces are racism and alcohol addiction.

Major Conflict

The major conflict is whether or not Junior and Rowdy will be able to repair their friendship after Junior goes to Reardan. Their relationship is symbolic of Junior's struggle to reconcile his roots and his ambition to build a life outside of the reservation.

The climax of the novel occurs when Junior leads the Reardan team to victory over his former classmates from Wellpinit; this is a turning point for Junior because he realizes that going to Reardan has given him hope for his future, but his old friends do not have that luxury.

Foreshadowing

1) Junior calls his sister "Mary Runs Away" (27) because she runs away from life and lives in their parents' basement. However, this nickname foreshadows Mary's impulsive decision to marry a man she has just met and run away to Montana with him.

2) Mr. P. tells Junior, "your friend Rowdy, he's given up. That's why he likes to hurt people. He wants them to feel as bad as he does" (42). This accurate analysis of Rowdy's mentality foreshadows the rejection and abuse that Rowdy inflicts on Junior once he chooses to leave Wellpinit for Reardan.

3) After Rowdy shaves off the Andruss brothers' eyebrows as penance for bullying Junior, Junior admits that "revenge... feels pretty good" (22). This foreshadows his decision to play aggressively in Reardan's rematch against Wellpinit so that he can humiliate Rowdy, a moment in which he finally realizes that revenge can be just as hurtful as the action that seemingly justified it.

Understatement

1) "'Uh, er, um,' I said. Yeah, I was so articulate" (84). Alexie uses understatement to convey Junior's self-awareness that he is nervous while defying his science teacher.

1) "Tonto" (64) - An allusion to the Native American sidekick to the Lone Ranger, a popular character from the American western genre. Tonto started appearing in serialized radio shows in 1933 and his characterization has contributed to the stereotype of Indians as "Noble Savages."

2) "Prince Charming" (81) - An allusion to the popular fairy tale trope of a dashing, handsome, white royal who always rescues damsels in distress. Junior imagines Rowdy telling him that he (Junior) is the antithesis of Prince Charming and therefore will never have a chance with Penelope.

1) "My hopes and dreams floated up in a mushroom cloud" (31). This description evokes the sense of hopelessness that overwhelms Junior once he discovers that he is expected to study geometry from the same textbook his mother used more than thirty years before. The image of a mushroom cloud is one of complete destruction, as it is commonly associated with massive bombings.

2) "...I could smell his breath. Onions and garlic and hamburger and shame and pain" (42). This imagery invokes Mr. P's sloppiness as well as the weight of his guilt about having purposely squashed Indian culture in his classroom. It is effective in showing how open Mr. P. is being with Junior - he is close enough so Junior can tell what he had for lunch, and he is also revealing the source of his pain.

3) "Those kids weren't just white. They were translucent. I could see the blue veins running through their skin like rivers" (56). This imagery emphasizes how different Junior feels at Reardan because of his brown skin.

1) Junior's dad misses Christmas to go on a drunken binge, but he manages to save a five-dollar bill for Junior in his boot. Junior calls the money "a beautiful and ugly thing" (151) because he knows how badly his dad probably wanted to use the five dollars to get more drunk, yet he resents his father for being drunk and missing the holidays in the first place.

2) Junior claims that many of his Reardan classmates' fathers are "good at hiding in plain sight" (153). This paradox invokes the mental absence of these parents, who may be home every night but do not pay any attention to their children.

Parallelism

1) "We were supposed to kill the Indian to save the child" (35). This use of parallelism underlines Mr. P.'s point that many white Americans have treated Indian culture as somehow threatening to American culture, thus encouraging white reservation teachers to force their Indian students to assimilate.

2) "My cartoons weren't just good for giggles; they were also good for poetry" (95). Here, the use of parallelism emphasizes the importance of Junior's (often humorous) cartoons - they are his way of expressing himself.

3) "They were constantly scraping together enough money to pay for gas, to get me lunch money, to buy me a new pair of jeans and a few new shirts" (119). This repetition emphasizes how hard Junior's parents are working to support their ambitious son.

Metonymy and Synecdoche

1) "I kept glancing over at Wellpinit as they ran their layup drills" (190). This is an example of synecdoche because Alexie uses "Wellpinit" to refer to the Wellpinit High School basketball team.

Personification

1) "That old, old, old, decrepit geometry book hit my heart with the force of a nuclear bomb" (31). By personifying the thirty-year-old geometry textbook that Junior is expected to study in his class at Wellpinit, Alexie makes the book a powerful symbol for the lack of educational resources on the reservation.

2) "The grief didn't hit me right away" (201). By personifying Junior's grief after hearing about Mary's death, Alexie gives the loss a physical presence, which reflects the devastating effect that the tragedy has on Junior's life.

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

The absolutely true diary of a part time indian

1) blackjack dealer

2) paper route

3) mowing lawns

Why does Mr.P say the following ?

Mr. P makes this comment because he not only blames himself for the condition of his students.... he puts them equally at blame for how they treat each other..... and for giving up.

"You were right to throw that book at me. I deserved to get...

On page 194, junior states that "one play can change your momentum forever." How does this quote describe his life after the basketball game? When, in your own life, has "one play" changed everything after? Explain

Junior finds a new sense of validation after his three point play. For once in his life, he is accepted by the main white social circles of high school. Jinior however feels ashamed that his new appreciation probably came at the expense of Rowdy....

Study Guide for The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian study guide contains a biography of Sherman Alexie, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
• The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian Summary
• Character List

Essays for The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie.

• An Exploration of Double Consciousness in Sherman Alexie’s The Absoultely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
• “A Time of Togetherness”: How Alexie Sherman and Velma Wallis use Christmas to Present Contemporary Native American Issues
• Race and Identity: 'The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian' and 'Monster'
• Exacerbating Oppression

Lesson Plan for The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

• About the Author
• Study Objectives
• Common Core Standards
• Introduction to The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
• Relationship to Other Books
• Bringing in Technology
• Notes to the Teacher
• Related Links
• The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian Bibliography

Wikipedia Entries for The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

• Introduction

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

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A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-3

Chapters 4-6

Chapters 7-9

Chapters 10-12

Chapters 13-15

Chapters 16-18

Chapters 19-21

Chapters 22-24

Chapters 25-27

Chapters 28-30

Character Analysis

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Near the beginning of the novel, Junior asks his parents “who has the most hope?” and his parents respond, “white people” (45). Similarly, Mr. P tells Junior he’ll find more hope the further he gets away from the reservation. Junior, however, says “I don’t know if hope is white” (51). Discuss the nature of hope in Absolutely True Diary , considering how it relates to race and white privilege. What gives Junior hope? Does he have more of it by the end of the novel? What role does Whiteness play, if any?

Junior’s father goes on a drinking bender, and when he returns, he gives Junior his last five dollars as a Christmas present. Junior describes the gift as a “beautiful and ugly thing.” What does Junior mean by this? What else is Absolutely True Diary might be considered “beautiful and ugly”?

Junior’s relationship with the Reservation is complicated and often contradictory. At times, the reservation seems like a place of despair, yet other times it seems a place of love and great joy. How has the reservation shaped the way Junior sees the world, and how does his relationship to it change and grow?

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It may seem contradictory to include hope, dreams, and loss in the same category, but in fact, in Junior’s experience, they’re very closely connected. At the beginning of the novel, Junior understands dreams and hopes primarily as lost opportunities: his mother and father, for example, “dreamed about being something other than poor, but they never got the chance to be anything because nobody paid attention to their dreams.” The same thing is true for his sister, Mary , who had plans and potential when she was in high school, but gave up and began living in her parents’ basement—a kind of symbolic burial. To Junior, the loss of hope is part of what it means to live on the rez and be Indian.

In the book, following one’s dreams, finding a place where hope can thrive, means leaving the reservation. Both Junior and Mary—whose nickname, Mary Runs Away, foreshadows her decision to leave—attempt to do this, although Mary’s death just after she’d begun to have hope again becomes yet another illustration of lost dreams and opportunities. Even for Penelope , who is white and thus, from Junior’s point of view, has hope as part of her birthright, having dreams means wanting to leave the place she came from. But the element of loss in hope is much stronger for Junior, whose decision to leave is seen as a betrayal by his friend Rowdy and many other members of the reservation community. It’s a denial of his heritage, a negation of identity almost like a death. By the end of the novel, Rowdy and others have made peace with Junior’s decision to go off in search of hope like “an old-time nomad”—that is, like one of his Indian ancestors. Even so, when Junior lists the people he will “always love and miss,” he includes Rowdy, his reservation, and his tribe as well as his loved ones who have died—a telling indication that in some ways, following his hopes and dreams ultimately means the loss of his friends, his family, and his home.

Hope, Dreams, and Loss ThemeTracker

Hope, Dreams, and Loss Quotes in The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

I think the world is a series of broken dams and floods, and my cartoons are tiny little lifeboats.

It sucks to be poor, and it sucks to feel that you somehow deserve to be poor. You start believing that you’re poor because you’re stupid and ugly. And then you start believing that you’re stupid and ugly because you’re Indian. And because you’re Indian you start believing you’re destined to be poor. It’s an ugly circle and there’s nothing you can do about it.

After high school, my sister just froze. Didn’t go to college, didn’t get a job. Didn’t do anything. Kind of sad, I guess. But she is also beautiful and strong and funny. She is the prettiest and strongest and funniest person who ever spent twenty-three hours a day alone in a basement.

And let me tell you, that old, old, old, decrepit geometry book hit my heart with the force of a nuclear bomb. My hopes and dreams floated up in a mushroom cloud. What do you do when the world has declared nuclear war on you?

“You’ve been fighting since you were born,” he said. “You fought off that brain surgery. You fought off those seizures. You fought off all the drunks and drug addicts. You kept your hope. And now, you have to take your hope and go somewhere where other people have hope.”

“You always thought you were better than me,” he yelled. “No, no, I don’t think I’m better than anybody. I think I’m worse than everybody else.” “Why are you leaving?” “I have to go. I’m going to die if I don’t leave.”

“Hey buddy,” I would have said. “How do I make a beautiful white girl fall in love with me?” “Well, buddy,” he would have said. “The first thing you have to do is change the way you look, the way you talk, and the way you walk. And then she’ll think you’re her fricking Prince Charming.”

I mean, the thing is, plenty of Indians have died because they were drunk. And plenty of drunken Indians have killed other drunken Indians. But my grandmother had never drunk alcohol in her life. Not one drop. That’s the rarest kind of Indian in the world.

Two thousand Indians laughed at the same time. … It was the most glorious noise I’d ever heard. And I realized that, sure, Indians were drunk and sad and displaced and crazy and mean, but dang, we knew how to laugh. When it comes to death, we know that laughter and tears are pretty much the same thing.

I realized that, sure, I was a Spokane Indian. I belonged to that tribe. But I also belonged to the tribe of American immigrants. And to the tribe of basketball players. And to the tribe of bookworms. And to the tribe of cartoonists. And to the tribe of chronic masturbators. And the tribe of teenage boys. And the tribe of small-town kids. And the tribe of Pacific Northwesterners. And the tribe of tortilla-chips-and-salsa lovers. And the tribe of poverty. And the tribe of funeral-goers. And the tribe of beloved sons. And the tribe of boys who really missed their best friends. It was a huge realization. And that’s when I knew that I was going to be okay.

“You’re an old-time nomad,” Rowdy said. “You’re going to keep moving all over the world in search of food and water and grazing land. That’s pretty cool.”

I would always love Rowdy. And I would always miss him, too. Just as I would always love and miss my grandmother, my big sister, and Eugene. Just as I would always love and miss my reservation and my tribe. I hoped and prayed that they would someday forgive me for leaving them. I hoped and prayed that I would someday forgive myself for leaving them.

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Essay Samples on Absolutely True Diary Of A Part-time Indian

The absolutely true diary of a part-time indian: the section analysis.

I think it’s really cool that the book takes each entry as a chapter and how each chapter begins with a heading of a certain theme instead of a date. My first impression of Junior is that he’s very positive and outgoing. He explains his...

• Absolutely True Diary Of A Part-time Indian
• Sherman Alexie

The Story Behind The Absolute True Diary Of A Part-time Indian

The Absolute True Diary of a Part-Time Indian is a novel written by Sherman Alexie. It was first published September 12, 2007, before it was rereleased in 2017 for its 10th anniversary. Over the years, the book has won several awards, such as three “year`s...

The Absolutely True Diary Of A Part-time Indian And The Tragedies In It

In this book, we meet the main character Arnold Spirit Jr. Where he tells about his life on the Spokane Indian reservation. “I was born with water in my brain” is the first line of the book. The narrator doesn’t waste any time telling you...

The Literary Analysis Of Absolutely True Diary Of A Part-time Indian

About the author Sherman Joseph Alexie, Jr. (born October 7, 1966) is a Spokane-Coeur d'Alene-American novelist, short story writer, poet, and filmmaker. His writings draw on his experiences as an Indigenous American with ancestry from several tribes. He grew up on the Spokane Indian Reservation...

Best topics on Absolutely True Diary Of A Part-time Indian

1. The Absolutely True Diary Of A Part-time Indian: The Section Analysis

2. The Story Behind The Absolute True Diary Of A Part-time Indian

3. The Absolutely True Diary Of A Part-time Indian And The Tragedies In It

4. The Literary Analysis Of Absolutely True Diary Of A Part-time Indian

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