The dialectic of self: An existential reading of identity in selected contemporary American Indian literatures

Inasmuch as the struggle of the American Indian mixedblood protagonist in most modern American Indian literatures has been traditionally perceived as a cultural one---one in which the character's sense of identity is frustrated by his mixed (often American Indian and white) heritage and which often leads him from a sense of alienation from both heritages to a rediscovery/reclamation of his American Indian culture---this same struggle may also be examined through the lens of the modern philosophy of existentialism as posited by Jean-Paul Sartre, whose theory relies upon the fundamental claim that one creates one's identity (in one's freedom) through a process of daily choices and actions. The mixedblood protagonists of some modern American Indian literatures tend to exemplify this existential search for identity, demonstrating characteristics of the displaced modernist figure of twentieth-century American literature. More specifically, existential concepts and themes such as alienation (angst, anxiety), bad faith, being, consciousness, freedom, and meaninglessness are evident in selected works by James Welch, Leslie Marmon Silko, and N. Scott Momaday, and are demonstrated by personae and protagonists whose struggle with identity is as existential as it is cultural.; Recent critical responses to American Indian literatures---particularly those attempting to redefine the relationship between American Indian writers and non-Indian readers---will be crucial to establishing the validity of using an existential (i.e., Euramerican) approach. I will therefore explore (within context) recent debates concerning such applications of Euramerican critical theories to American Indian texts as well as those surrounding the nature and definition of American Indian identity.; It is my objective to explore specific American Indian literary works by Welch, Silko, and Momaday, to reveal the numerous existential themes and concepts (e.g., alienation/anguish, bad faith, being, consciousness, freedom, meaninglessness) that are present in these selected works, and to discuss the significant ways in which these existential ideas may serve to enrich one's cultural appreciation for American Indian literatures, as well as how these specific texts both reinforce and challenge existential thought.