Chapter One The Textual Space: Metaphor of the TraumaticSymptom of Tayo’s Dislocation
1.1 Multiple Narrative and Juxtaposition of Double Plots: Implicating TraumaticDoublethink
Joseph Frank figured out that one of the measures to make the space of a text isjuxtaposition. “By this juxtaposition of past and present...history becomes ahistorical”,and “past and present are apprehended spatially, locked in a timeless unity that, whileit may accentuate surface differences, eliminates any feeling of sequence by the veryact of juxtaposition” (63). David A. Rice also acknowledged the juxtaposition inCeremony. He thought, the disorder of the text made by the juxtaposition between thetraditional Native storytelling writings and the Western style writings, implies thechaotic mind of Tayo (118). Silko also has admitted that in her interview with LauraColtelli “the whole novel is a bundle of stories”(245), which concludes the main plotof Tayo and his family’s story and the traditional Native American mythologies.Writing in a postmodern literary style, the multiple perspective of narrative could fillin gaps in the main plot of Tayo. For example, the insertion of Helen Jean’s storyindicates the similar story of Tayo’s mother that unspoken, which plumped thecharacters, and the twists and turns of the plots could attract the readers at the sametime. “Running parallel with the traditional stories... [Ceremony] are written in poeticlines to separate them from the prose” (Shi 101), this chapter regards the storiesoutside the main plot as its subplot, and from this point of view, there are double plotsin Ceremony which means “the subplot serves to broaden our perspective on the mainplot and to enhance rather than diffuse the overall effect” (Abram, Harpham 266).Each story serves the main plot when they are juxtaposed and it can construct severaldifferent double plots when subplots change.
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1.2 Nonlinear Narrative and Flashbacks of Trauma Memories: Implicating TraumaticMemory Intrusion
It’s not hard to notice the characteristic of nonlinear narration of this novel,especially in the first half of it when Tayo’s serious post-traumatic stress disorder(PTSD) had no improvement. Although the nonlinear writing technique enhances thedifficulty of the reading process, making the main plot of confusing, the narrativeplays its own role in expressing the chaotic mind of Tayo. Just as Long Diyong says inhis paper, Claude Simon already began to try to replace the traditional linear narrativewith the description of several scenes in the most important moments of theprotagonist’s life, while exploring a spiral novel structure like Baroque art, to showthe “hybrid” of the feelings, memories, and imagination of inner activity of theprotagonist in his fist novel—The Cheat ( “Spatial Turn of Narratology Research” 66).Likewise, the nonlinear narrative in Ceremony helps to reflect Tayo’s mental state inparoxysm more directly, because space is the outcome of time or history (Deng 270).And the changeable narrative time in the text helps to construct the textual space ofCeremony, which is an obvious textual arrangement to enhance the implication of histrauma symptom.
Flashback, a typical nonlinear writing technique, which means “interpolatednarratives or scenes… which represent events that happened before the time at whichthe work opened” (Abram, Harpham 267). It usually appears as a sudden intrusioninto the main plot. This kind of intrusion appeared as Tayo’s trauma experience in thebeginning of Ceremony quite often. Judith Herman explains traumatic memoryintrusion of traumatized people in Trauma and Recovery:
Long after the danger is past, traumatized people relive the event as thoughit were continually recurring in the present. They cannot resume the normalcourse of their lives, for the trauma repeatedly interrupts. It is as if timestops at the moment of trauma. The traumatic moment becomes encoded inan abnormal form of memory, which breaks spontaneously intoconsciousness, both as flashbacks during waking states and as traumaticnightmares during sleep. Small, seemingly insignificant reminders can alsoevoke these memories, which often return with all the vividness andemotional force of the original event. (Herman 37)
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Chapter Two The Social Space: Implication of the TraumaticCause of Social Isolation Tayo Suffered
2.1 Isolation from Euroamerican Social Space: Rejection of the Whites
The social space was pided into the whites’ and the Native’s geographically aswell as culturally. Living in Pueblo reservation, as an “other” of the whites, Tayo wasisolated from the white society and was rejected by this community once he reachedout to them since childhood. The isolation was reflected by the residence of the twosocieties firstly. The whites took the stolen place from the Natives for granted, onlyleft some reservations like concentration camps for the Natives specifically. Most ofthe Native tribes were confined in the reservations west of Mississippi, while anabundance of lands were taken over and occupied by the whites. The contrast ofNatives’ living area between the days before and after the whites’ coming can revealthe behavior of deprivation and the geographical isolation and rejection of theNatives.
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2.2 Isolation from the Native Social Space: Rejection of the Natives
Being isolated from the Native social space was a general problem of the younggenerations who catered to the Western culture and values. But if Natives didn’tvenerate the culture and values of their own nation, they would easily to beabandoned by their own community in reverse. And the cultural rejection from theNative society appeared as well, which could also cause a deep confusion about theirNative identities, when they questioned their American identities at the same time.According to that, what should the Natives who grew up in Pueblo reservation do wasto learn something about Native ceremonial tradition, which was the unchangeablecore of the Native tradition. But the reality was, not only Tayo, but also other younggenerations like Rocky and Emo knew little about that, however, they only to cater tothe Western culture and values blandly. For instance, when Rocky, a model studentbrought up in a standard mode of white’s education, gutted a deer with Tayo, theA-student in white school who was only taught the Western values, instead of taking“off his jacket and covered the deer’s head” like other Natives (Silko 50), but showedno respect for the deer, the sacred animal of the Natives. Likewise, Emo also ignoredNative tradition but only admired and catered to the white things and it brought hisdestruction finally. Being devoted to be accepted by the white society, Emo insisted totake along the teeth that he collected in the war, as well as the “GI haircut” (Silko 252)that stood for his Western heroism complex in a long time after the war, but lookeddown upon their own community and traditions. Having no sense of belonging eitherin the white society nor in the Native society, he was used by the white’s “witchery”and became a destroyer of his own nation with a strong inferiority feeling.
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Chapter Three The Topographical Space: Suggestion of the Healing Function ofNative “Places and Vision” and Culture Syncretism................... 28
3.1 Re-experiencing the Traditional Native “Places and Vision” :Reconstructing the Native Identity...........................29
3.2 Breaking the Binary Between the White Cities and the Reservation:Reconstructing Native American Identity...........34
Chapter Three The Topographical Space: Suggestion of theHealing Function of Native “Places and Vision” and CultureSyncretism
Bearing all the meanings of identity and the value of personal life, memory ismore spatially characterized than be characterized by time. The intrusive memory ofTayo in this novel clearly shows the spatial characteristics (Deng Yingling 258), and itplays an important role in suggesting the different stages of his healing trip. In SpatialTurn of Narratology, Long Diyong recognizes that, every personal thinking and groupbehavior must be carried out in a specific space. Space can be said to be the locationof our actions and consciousness. On the contrary, space only be perceived and usedto become a living space firstly, then it can enter the realm of meaning and emotion ofpeople. In other words, the narration of a text should take a basis of a clear spacereflected by the place setting, and the places can suggest meanings and loadcharacter’s or the author’s emotion sometimes. The space reflected by place settingscan be called as the topographical space of a text. In Zoran’s opinion, thetopographical space means the “space as a static entity” (315) that “provides asufficiently clear picture of the world” (316). In the study of narratology: theory,interpretation, cross-media, Deng Yingling recognizes that, in the topographical space,the places where the characters stay have a close relationship with their personalgrowth, the living conditions of their family and their personal identities (256). Silkowas very good at taking advantage of changeable space to tell stories in this novel.Therefore, analyzing the perse places and vision which are used to construct thetopographical space of this novel, the changing of the topographical space may givesome suggestions about the changing of Tayo’s psychological trauma. With theimprovement of Tayo’s PTSD, the topographical space of this novel can suggest thehealing function of the landscapes and the vision in resolving the problem of Tayo’spersonal identity crisis.
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Conclusion
The narrative constructs a form with multiple spaces in Ceremony. Seeing Tayo’strauma and recovery process as a clue, This paper explores the implications of thethree parallel levels of spaces that are constructed by Silko. The verbal structure ofCeremony constructs the textual space while the plots in this novel construct twoopposing social spaces and the topographical space. From the perspective of thosespaces Silko constructed, it can be found that the spaces imply the root cause ofTayo’s psychological trauma, its symptom, as well as the solution of its recoveryrespectively. And that implication is exactly one of the functions of Silko’s spatialnarrative in this novel. According to that, to explain Tayo’s trauma and recoveryprocess, this paper provides a new interpretation of it from the perspective of spatialnarrative.
In the paper, Ceremony’s chaotic textual space that was created by juxtapositionand flashbacks, is a metaphor of Tayo’s traumatic symptom of dislocation, while thetwo separated social spaces also implies his traumatic cause of social isolation. Withthat interpretation, along with the changing of Tayo’s PTSD, the changing ofCeremony’s multiple spaces also makes the development of Tayo’s struggling andhealing process become reasonable. When analyzing at the level of topographicalspace, Tayo was healed by the virtual and factual “journey” of Betonie’s ceremony.His re-experiencing of traditional Native “places and vision” suggests the healingfunction of Native “places and vision”, while the repeated boundary issues suggest thesolution of culture syncretism in preventing the identity crisis from the Natives. Thatis, a solution of returning to the tradition and accepting the Western culture at thesame time. Just as Yadav says, “Silko’s writings explicate harmonious coexistence andsyncretism as best way towards the survival of Native American identity and themaintenance of cultural continuity” (106).
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