Louise Erdrich's Concepts Of Historical Pluralism In Tracks And The Plague Of Doves

In Tracks and The Plague of Doves,American Indian writer Louise Erdrich revisits tribal history and introduces the American Indian perspective into representing tribal history.Viewing from native perspective,Erdrich presents an alternative tribal history on controversial issues of land policies,religious assimilation and Boarding School education.In the novels,the civilized land policies are strategies for land plunder,Catholic purification becomes traumatic destruction of Indian souls,and boarding school is not for better education but extinction of native culture.The plausible version of history in Erdrich's novels has brought the official treatment of American Indian history under skepticism.It is obvious that history differs every time when observed from different stances.In her historical revision,Erdrich purposefully applies polyphonic narrators of Postmodernism to represent pluralistic tribal history.In addition to adopting independent narrators of different backgrounds and values,Erdrich skillfully arranges the multiple narratives into what Bakhtin called “Great Dialogues”.Moreover,Erdrich's concept of history implied in the two novels provides a theoretical guidance for re-understanding American Indian history.The thesis deciphers Erdrich's concepts of history from comparative analysis of textual content and narrative methodology in the two novels,while behind the deciphering is theoretical basis from New Historicism and Deconstructionism.New Historicism regards history as a subgenre of literature,and Deconstructionism suggests not treating history from duality opposition.Erdrich from the two theories concludes that no one can judge history but individuals can interpret it.And the pluralistic interpretations in turn would provide a comprehensive understanding of past occurrences.