{"id":2416,"date":"2023-10-11T21:18:12","date_gmt":"2023-10-12T01:18:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/?p=2416"},"modified":"2023-10-11T21:18:12","modified_gmt":"2023-10-12T01:18:12","slug":"more-than-a-caricature","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/2023\/10\/11\/more-than-a-caricature\/","title":{"rendered":"More than a caricature"},"content":{"rendered":"

The section of Qwo-Li Driskill\u2019s \u201c(Auto)biography of Mad\u201d I found myself coming back to is titled \u201cFear.\u201d The poem in its entirety is harrowing, it rather clinically recounts the symptoms of the systemic oppression of indigenous Americans. \u201cFear,\u201d however, seems to slightly deviate from some of the hard-hitting words and phrases that come before it, like the opening: \u201cAbuse, Physical, ii, 3; \/ Sexual, Age 4; 28\u201d (l.2-3). In some ways, it may seem counterintuitive to have some sort of incongruity in a poem of this magnitude\u2014 maybe it should all be unequivocally dark. I think that Driskill\u2019s intent in including this section is to emphasize that people really are much more than just their trauma and life circumstances. Not every facet of a person is a direct result of their traumatic experiences. This is significant as it can help us in further humanizing, and aiding, minority groups of which we are not a part.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The section of \u201cFear\u201d that I would like to point to is, \u201cof hairs on the backs of hands, 14; \/ of loud noises, 19-28; \/ of men, 4, 14, 46, 128; \/ of pencils, ix, 4, 14, 26-28; \/ of people hiding in laundry piles, 3-28\u201d (l.56-62). What first struck me about this section was the fact that I could make a clear link between some of these fears and the possible trauma that the narrator underwent. Loud noises and men as triggers are often attributed to trauma, and we can more readily understand why those would evoke an anxiety response. What about \u201chairs on the backs of hands,\u201d or \u201cpencils,\u201d or \u201cpeople hiding in laundry piles?\u201d I believe those bring a sense of humanity to the poem that was intended to make this section even more impactful. While these fears could be related to trauma, they could also just be the result of being a human. People who have undergone horrific violence and trauma are still humans. They may have an irrational fear of \u201chairs on the backs of hands\u201d for no particular reason. By attributing entire beings to their worst experiences, we reduce them to caricatures, rather than people. <\/span><\/p>\n

This idea of fear as a natural byproduct of humanity is important to the overall theme of Driskill\u2019s poems, which in turn relates to much of our course content. Yes, the narrator in Driskill\u2019s poem \u201cMap of the Americas\u201d is angry about the cruelty their people have faced, but is also able to love a white man. In \u201cCherokee Love Haiku,\u201d the narrator recounts a loving encounter, where, in \u201cFor Matthew,\u201d the narrator, \u201c…wanted the city to burn\u201d (l.11). Indigenous people, queer people, people of color, women\u2014 they\u2019re all people. They all deserve the space to have irrational fears, to mourn, and to love. In understanding that, we can then make appropriate space for all types of people, and dismantle oppressive systems.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The section of Qwo-Li Driskill\u2019s \u201c(Auto)biography of Mad\u201d I found myself coming back to is titled \u201cFear.\u201d The poem in its entirety is harrowing, it rather clinically recounts the symptoms of the systemic oppression of indigenous Americans. \u201cFear,\u201d however, seems to slightly deviate from some of the hard-hitting words and phrases that come before it, … Continue reading More than a caricature<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5329,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[346798],"tags":[346806],"class_list":["post-2416","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2023-blog-post","tag-qwo-li-driskill"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2416","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5329"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2416"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2416\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2416"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2416"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2416"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}