ABSTRACT
The fourth chapter turns to Leslie Marmon Silko’s novel, Ceremony. Silko extends the process of Amerindian identification addressed in the preceding chapter on Momaday. Silko’s novel suggests that there is a natural relation between ancestry, culture, and geography. This natural relation defies socialization into non-Amerindian traditions, such that attempts at inter-cultural assimilation may lead to physical and mental illness. This chapter focuses particular attention on Silko’s use of various cross-cultural narrative genres—heroic, romantic, and sacrificial—in developing her account of Amerindian social identity in the U.S. It focuses particular attention on sacrificial emplotment, which is ubiquitous in the novel.
