The Meaning of Little Tree’s Reactions against Colonial Education

42

4.4. The Meaning of Little Tree’s Reactions against Colonial Education

Learning from history is the most important learning for each Cherokee generation. Granpa teaches Little Tree the importance of knowing the past. He tells that without knowing the past or history, someone does not know where they came from and what they will be in the future. In this case, the history what Granpa meant is the history in Cherokee version. One of significant history should be known by child generation of Cherokee is about Trail of Tears. This event has a big impact in Cherokee’s life after European came and imperialized the land. Before white people arrived in America, Cherokee lived in the fertile mountainous. They lived by their own ways of life. When, White came, Cherokee accepted them. It was no matter for Cherokee to live by other nations. But, White took over all of they could take. Trail of Tears is the incident when white government instructed Cherokee nation to give up their land in the mountainous and moved into the area White did not want to. The government gave them horse to their movement, but Cherokee did not ride horses. No choice, but walking to reach the new area. They spent long times and seasons. Thousands of Cherokee passed away due to the difficult and dangerous journey. Cherokee did not speak nor cried, but many of white saw them were crying. Finally, there was a miracle, some of them were able to run away and back to the mountainous and lived in the remote area until White forgot them. Generally, the main characteristic of Cherokee education is their unifying with nature. Cherokee understands nature not as material object to be dominated but as a living entity, a friend and partner of human kind. In this way, nature can PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 43 be understood as teacher in a school without walls, and the Indian as her teaching assistant. Cherokee educates their children by introducing nature and the way of their life through the real experiences. They give what actually needed by their children to survive in the forest. Granpa and Granma, as Cherokee, always educate Little Tree about The Way of Cherokee. They always keep Little Tree to learn by doing, to experience by himself, to take decision by himself, then finally to take a lesson from what he experienced. They let him value something by himself. They liberate Little Tree to do whatever he wants to do in his unifying with nature. But, still they guide Little Tree in his learning. They give advices and direction when Little Tree needs. In short, Cherokee never scolds their children in their independent learning. The different point of view comes from Europe, the colonizer. Coming in the land of America, they colonized it. As Ania Loomba’s definition of colonialism, they took over the lands, formed new communities there, and governed it. Europe colonized the Native American cruelly. Not only did they made physical violence, but also did indoctrination or re-produced ideology of native through institution apparatuses and politic. One of the effective apparatuses used by White is education. Elaborating law and political interest, they create a system in education. For instance, the education which was experienced by Little Tree in the orphanage. Deeply, the school system in the orphanage is a form of indoctrination. The books and material they studied show the Indian as a savage and bad, so that they become ashamed of their culture and identity. Indian young generation will willingly act PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 44 as White by this construction. It is White hegemony to reproduce native identity and representation with White version. Systematically, the Reverend, the school committees, and the curriculum force the representation that Indian is bad, uncivilized, infidel, and not be saved by God. They construct in children’s minds that the best one is White. They do not admit the existence of Indian in the orphanage. All children must speak in English. They also deny the marriage between Indian and White. All are the ways to brush up the mind of Indian generation to be White. The colonial education described in the novel is intensely concerned with training students to stop thinking and start obeying. School determines to accomplish it in a constant and total atmosphere of violence. The orphanage and the school are like a prison for Indian children. They must be very discipline and be polite. They have to obey all of the rules. The students will get cruel physical punishment when they break the rules. They also are not allowed speak up if they do not being asked by the teachers and the Reverend. What happened in the orphanage is a personality killing toward Indian children. Here, Little Tree is the representative of his generation. He is the battle between white and Cherokee hegemony of ideology. Cherokee is represented as bad, savage, uncivilized by White. From this representation, when Little Tree sees anything by White’s point of view, he will be ashamed to be Cherokee and acts as White. In other words, Little Tree will be inferior when he uses white people’s representation of Indian. But, Cherokee represents themselves by their own point of view. This PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 45 point of view determines their world and their way of life. So looking at the situation through their paradigm is important for them in resisting and reacting against the white indoctrination. Little Tree experiences both Cherokee and white educational system. Since he declares himself as a Cherokee, he is enjoying the way of Cherokee. He knows the history and life of Cherokee through Cherokee point of view. This situation creates awareness about the representation of their identity by White and also by themselves. The reactions of Little Tree against colonial education seen in the novel, then, describes the resistance of the colonized people in finding a voice and identity by reclaim their own past. Little Tree is the representative of the colonized people fighting against the colonizer. Although Little Tree is mixed-blood because he has white blood from his mother, it does not matter in his life. He is not confused about his identity. As declaring himself as Cherokee, he is Cherokee. He looks at the colonial situation by Indian’s point of view, the colonized one. He lives by the Indian ways. In this case, the colonizer fails in using education apparatuses to indoctrinate him. The colonizer fails to colonize the mental and ideology of Little Tree. In other words, it is not blood that determines the identity, but the way of education. The reactions of Little Tree against colonial education describe one of the reactions of colonized people against colonizer that is abrogation. It is the refusal of colonized people to all aspects and culture domination brought by the colonizer because the colonized people have awareness of colonizer’s representation. Then, they will reclaim their past and identity and liberate themselves from the PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 46 colonizer. Little Tree rejects the representation of Indian stereotyped by white people. He does not want to accept the system brought by White. It shows the native resistance against colonizer by rejecting the colonial culture and ideology. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 47

CHAPTER V CONCLUSIONS, SUGGESTIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS

The last chapter of this study consists of three parts. The first part is the conclusion of the analysis which answers the problems formulated in Chapter I. The second part is the suggestion for future researchers who will conduct a study of Forrest Carter’s The Education of Little Tree. The last part will present recommendations for English teachers and lecturer who will use the novel as their teaching and learning materials.

5.1. Conclusions