Thomson Highways The Rez Sisters Essay -- Thomson Highway Rez Sisters

Thomson Highways The Rez SistersWorks Cited Not IncludedThe play The Rez Sisters is pen by one of Canadas most celebrated playwrights, Tomson Highway. Highway was born in 1951 in northwestern Manitoba. He went on to study at the University of Manitoba and graduated from the University of Western Ontario, with honors in Music and English. Native writings is inspired by contemporary social problems set about native Canadians today alcohol and drug abuse, suicide, wife battering, family violence, the racism of the justice system, loneliness, rejection, youth awareness, as well as modern-day environmental issues.(P. 172 Native Literature in Canada.) Highway once said, We grew up with myths. Theyre the core of our identity as the great unwashed.(P. 172 Native Literature in Canada.) I am going to focus on the image and identity of Native people as seen through the play The Rez Sisters.Identity is how you view yourself and your life. (p. 12 Knots in a String.) Your identity helps you det ermine where you prize you fit in, in your life. It is a rich complexity of images, psyches and associations.(p. 12 Knots in a String.) It is given that as we go through our lives and encounter different experiences our identity of yourselves and where we croak may change. As this happens we may gain or relinquish new values and from this identity and image our influenced. A bad self-image and low self-esteem may melodic line part of identity? besides often the cause is not a loss of identity itself so much as a loss of belong. cordial psychologists suggest that identity is closely related to our culture. Native people today have been face with this challenge against their identity as they are increasingly faced with a non-native society. I volition prove that the play The Rez Sisters showed this loss of identity and loss of belonging. When a native person leaves the reservation to go and start a new life in a city they are forced to adapt to a lifestyle they are not accustom ed to. They do not tonicity as though they fit in or belong to any particular culture. They are faced with extreme racism and stereotypes from other people in the nonreservational society. The Rez Sisters won the Dora Mavor Moore award for the best play in 1986-87 and later went on to earn extravagant praise at the Edinburgh Festival. (P. 172 Native Literature in Canada.) The play is full of comedy, trag... ...rs, ?was one of the most toughing exuberant, cleverly crafted and utterly entrancing plays?(Cover The Rez Sisters.) Tomson Highway did a great job at giving the reader an idea of what reserve life is about. He gave us the opportunity to experience the hardships of native people and some insight to how they form their identity. After reading this wonderfully written play I do believe that our culture plays a very important role in how we as people form our identity and determines where we feel we belong. Nanabush had a great deal to do with the women keeping their current ide ntities and since of belonging. I feel that if we believe in a spirit and surrender or lives to them they will take care of us just as Nanabush did in this play. We all need to belong somewhere and feel comfort in our lives. We as humane beings need to open our eyes and see we can all belong together and live in one society without dropping our culture but before this can happen we need to end racism and stereotyping. These are the two main factors that push people, more commonly native people, into the loss of belonging the loss of their culture and the loss of the core of their identity.