The Only Good Indians

76 pages • 2 hours read

The Only Good Indians

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2020

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Introduction

Before Reading

During Reading

After Reading

During Reading

Reading Questions & Paired Texts

Reading Check and Short Answer Questions on key points are designed for guided reading assignments, in-class review, formative assessment, quizzes, and more.

PROLOGUE-PART 1, CHAPTER 6

Reading Check

1. What is most likely being represented when the flickering light reminds Lewis of the elk calf’s eye?

2. What does Gabe call his daughter?

3. What transgression is at the center of the crime Lewis and his friends committed during the “Thanksgiving Classic”?

4. What specific kind of imagery does Jones use to describe the event at the center of the “Thanksgiving Classic”?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. What point might Jones be making by blurring the line between past and present in the prologue?

2. What makes Lewis insecure regarding his identity? How does this tie into the theme of Being a “Good Indian”?

3. What did the crew do 10 years ago and why has it left Lewis with such guilt?

4. What drives the crew’s actions on their fateful hunt?

5. What might Jones be saying about stereotypes in this section of the novel and how does it relate to the theme of Being a “Good Indian”?

Paired Resource

“Common Portrayals of Indigenous People”

This webpage from Canada’s Centre for Digital Media Literacy examines the stereotyping of Indigenous people common in mass media.
As discussed in this article, stereotypes shape perceptions of Being a “Good Indian.”
Jones’s characters are hyperaware of the stereotypes by which they are constantly judged. In what ways does Jones examine the impact of these stereotypes and how might the results relate to larger themes and social commentary?

PART 1, CHAPTERS 7-12

Reading Check

1. What does Lewis find unusual about Harley’s death?

2. What does Lewis see between the slats of the moving train?

3. Once he decides Peta cannot possibly be Elk-Head Woman, whom does Lewis suspect?

4. What detail regarding Shaney’s death is ironic?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. How does Lewis’s rationalization of Shaney’s death further incriminate him?

2. How does Lewis’s intimacy with storytelling get him into trouble and what underlying message might this trouble support?

Paired Resource

“The Deer Woman and a Collective Return to Equality”

This essay by Isabell Retamoza examines her take on Deer Woman, a cultural figure upon which Elk Head Woman is loosely based.
In some stories and roles, Deer Woman violently corrects acts of sexual transgression, relating to the theme of Feminine Rage as a Vengeful Force.
Based on this resource and the text, how do Deer Woman and Elk Head Woman compare?

“How Parents’ Trauma Leaves Biological Traces in Children”

This Scientific American article explores the concepts of generational trauma and epigenetics and offers a parallel to the entity that manifests as Elk Head Woman.
The study of epigenetics connects to the novel’s theme of The Consequences of Abusing Nature.
How might the concept of generational trauma and epigenetics relate to Elk Head Woman and Indigenous people?

PART 2, CHAPTERS 13-18

Reading Check

1. What metaphorical concept does Gabe use to describe narrowly missing death again and again despite putting oneself into dangerous situations?

2. Who does Gabe claim the sweat is in honor of?

3. What is Cassidy’s nickname and what is his given name?

4. What is free throw shooting, according to Denorah’s older sister Trace?

5. How does Denorah view basketball?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. Why might the author have changed the perspective to Elk Head Woman’s in Part 2?

2. Stylistically, how does Jones create sympathy for the elk?

3. If ambiguity created tension in Part 1, on what literary device does Jones rely on in Part 2?

4. Why does Gabe say Denorah’s basketball style reflects her identity and culture and how does this help explain why he was mad at her coach for benching her?

5. What added pressure is Denorah up against at games, besides the pressure of winning and being scouted for college ball?

Paired Resource

“In His New Book, Stephen Graham Jones Explores the Idea of ‘Good Indians’”

This NPR interview explores Graham’s creative process and inspirations for the novel.
The interview examines the theme of Being a “Good Indian.”
Before the sweat, Victor tells Nathan that Cass and Gabe are examples of who he might become. Why is there so much ambiguity in this statement? How does the sweat reveal the ways Nathan, Cass, and Gabe can also be “good Indians” despite past choices and current challenges?

PART 2, CHAPTERS 19-26

Reading Check

1. What accounts for the difference between use of the terms “Indian,” “Native,” “Indigenous,” or “Aboriginal,” according to Gabe and Cass?

2. For whom does Nate first pour water?

3. Whom does Gabe see in the lodge with them?

4. What underpins the etiquette of pouring water before drinking it during their sweat?

5. How does Gabe recognize Elk Head Woman for who she really is?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. How might Neesh’s old saying “Arrows are straight but they have to bend too” provide a clue as to how one might become a “good Indian”?

2. Why does Victor tell Nathan their visit is not just about the sweat?

3. What is the sweat ritual? Why is the event ironic?

4. In what ways does the dead dog Gabe finds foreshadow what will happen next?

5. Who has Nathan always identified with and how did his white teacher, Mr. Massey, undermine this?

PART 3, CHAPTERS 27-31

Reading Check

1. What does Denorah exemplify with her longshot against Elk Head Woman?

2. Who do Denorah and Nathan become?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. What does seeing the elk bones force Denorah to confront?

2. How does Denorah stop the cycle?

3. What might ending the story like a campfire tale suggest about being a “good Indian”?

Paired Resource

“How Native Americans Made Basketball Their Own” and “Why We Play Basketball: The Importance of Sport in the Native American Community”

Both essays examine the importance of basketball in Indigenous American communities.
“Rezball” exemplifies resilience and resistance; the topics in the essays connect to the theme of Being a “Good Indian.”
Why is Denorah’s relationship with basketball foundational to her identity and ability to beat Elk Head Woman?

“What Happens to the Final Girl After the Movie Ends?”

This TEDx Talk given by Morgan Podraza examines tropes within the “slasher” subgenre and the ways in which some horror series represent the impact of violence against women.
In what ways does Graham both use and subvert “slasher” tropes like “the unstoppable monster” and “the final girl”? How might his techniques create a truer sense of justice than traditional “slasher” plots?

Recommended Next Reads

Mexican Gothic by Siliva Moreno-Garcia

Responding to a terrified letter from her newlywed cousin, Noemí arrives at High Place, an estate in the Mexican countryside. To save her cousin, she must navigate mysteries related to the estate’s mining empire, but she realizes she may be the one in peril.
Shared themes include The Consequences of Abusing Nature.
Shared elements include examinations of colonialization and cycles of violence, the supernatural, and literary horror.
Mexican Gothic on SuperSummary

Beloved by Toni Morrison

Sethe and Paul D have escaped enslavement and reunited after 18 years, but their attempts to make a life together are stymied by past traumas, secrets, and the ghost of a baby in a grave marked with a single word: Beloved. When a 19-year-old woman arrives calling herself Beloved, it is up to Denver, Sethe’s youngest child, to protect her family from the hardships and danger that linger long after slavery is abolished.
Shared themes include Feminine Rage as a Vengeful Force and The Consequences of Trauma and Abuse, and the horrors of the past haunting the present.
Shared elements include literary horror, multiple perspectives, haunting by supernatural entities, and the persistent legacies of violence and oppression.
Beloved on SuperSummary

Reading Questions Answer Key

PROLOGUE-Part 1, CHAPTER 6

Reading Check

1. Lewis’s guilt (Chapter 1)

2. Finals Girl (Chapter 2)

3. Excess/Lack of respect (Chapter 6)

4. Images of warfare (Chapter 6)

Short Answer

1. By comparing the relationship between Ricky and his boss to treaty deals made with the US Cavalry, underscoring the racist attitudes Ricky must endure at work and in his social life, and ending with a headline that refuses to implicate the roughnecks who killed Ricky, Jones suggests that relationships and attitudes have changed very little between past and present. (Prologue)

2. Moving from the Blackfeet Reservation, marrying his white wife, Peta, working for the US government, adjusting to white cultural expectations at home and work, and having no contact with his friends for 10 years makes Lewis question his right to still be considered Blackfoot. His friends back home question his commitment, and his new social group wants him to conform to a stereotype, making it difficult for him to define what it means to be a “good Indian” for himself. (Chapter 2)

3. The crew entered the elders’ section and killed far more elk than they could use or even carry out. Lewis also had to repeatedly shoot a young cow before she finally died, and when skinning her, he realized she was pregnant. Lewis is guilty of poaching food from the elders, waste, and disrupting natural cycles. Since these are the same kinds of crimes perpetrated by Spanish and US governments through ongoing colonization, at the core of his guilt is the suspicion that he is not a “good Indian.” (Chapters 1-6)

4. Lewis describes both a sense of entitlement for having done the work of hunting (as if their efforts meant they were “owed” an elk) and a desire to be a “good Indian.” These feelings led to the decision to enter the elders’ plot and to the mob mentality and bloodlust that led to their excessive killing. (Chapter 6)

5. Jones’s characters are self-aware and know when they are expected to play their roles, such as Ricky agreeing to be “Chief” and assuming the role of the “tough Indian” or Lewis’s role-breaking feats headlining in his inner newspaper. This self-awareness creates a commentary that exposes how being a “good Indian” is often a conscious and constant effort to assume many conflicting roles. The characters maintain this effort even while knowing that none of the roles fit; stereotypical roles are merely storytelling devices, and while stories are appealing in their simplicity, they can’t capture all the complexities of the real world. (Chapters 1-6)

PART 1, CHAPTERS 7-12

Reading Check

1. She’s trampled. (Chapter 7)

2. An elk-headed woman (Chapter 8)

3. Shaney (Chapter 10)

4. She is scalped. (Chapter 11)

Short Answer

1. Like the elk he killed, and similar to the judgment of white settlers, he excuses his brutal and unnecessary actions by claiming that she was never human. This toxic attitude perpetuates the cycles of violence against women, nature, and Indigenous people in the text (and in fact gives rise to all cycles of violence). (Chapter 12)

2. An avid reader, Lewis mistakes the story-logic he loves so much for actual logic, leading him to try to rationalize the inexplicable and ambiguous by assigning himself in the protagonist role and placing Peta and Shaney into roles of red herring and real antagonist. Using story logic, he then proceeds to rationalize, kill, and mutilate them. While this is indicative of Lewis’s inability to think logically, when paired with messages related to stereotyping and news headlines, Lewis’s crimes become a metaphor for the damaging impact of taking stories and story-logic at face value, whether from the news, internet, rumor, or even history books. (Chapter 12)

PART 2, CHAPTERS 13-18

Reading Check

1. Counting coup (Chapter 15)

2. Lewis (Chapter 15)

3. Thinks Twice/Sees Elk (Chapter 16)

4. A ritual (Chapter 18)

5. A battle/war (Chapter 18)

Short Answer

1. Looking at the world and the incident from the perspective of the elks’ collective consciousness creates a counternarrative to the idea that an elk is just an animal. This humanizes their plight, encourages empathy, and reminds the reader that cycles of historical wrongs have not just been perpetrated against humans, but against the land. (Chapter 13)

2. First, using second person to embody the voice of Elk Head Woman brings the reader as close to the action as possible, so that the reader must see and feel what the calf felt when the crew arrived. Second, by including the fear of trains and the hunters who pinned them in an earlier massacre, the parallel to treatment of Indigenous people by white settlers and the US government makes it clear that not just one act, but a cycle of acts must be broken before healing, justice, or forgiveness can occur. (Chapter 13)

3. Jones relies on dramatic irony and the juxtaposition of perspectives as Elk Head Woman stalks her next victims who are unaware that she is coming. (Chapter 14)

4. Denorah’ style in playing basketball shows creativity, risk-taking, joy, and a refusal to back down in tight spots. Gabe relates these traits to being a “good Indian.” He is angry that her coach would punish her and ask her to tone her game down; he sees this as asking her to change who she is for the benefit of white teams. (Chapter 17)

5. Denorah and her team must endure racist taunts from the crowd, showing that Denorah must be tougher and hold herself to a higher standard of performance. (Chapter 18)

PART 2, CHAPTERS 19-26

Reading Check

1. Personal/Generational preferences (Chapter 21)

2. His friend Tre (Chapter 23)

3. Lewis and Ricky (Chapter 24)

4. Honor for ancestors (Chapter 25)

5. Her eyes (Chapter 25)

Short Answer

1. The concept of the arrow is brought up regarding how to run the sweat ritual, with Gabe and Cass making jokes about consulting the “Indian book” about the procedures( which doesn’t exist). The idea is that rules and traditions may keep a person on a straight path, but people must also, like the bow, bend to fit their circumstances before they can start on the path. Adaptation means there are many ways to be a “good Indian” and to do traditions “right.” (Chapter 19)

2. Victor wants to show Nathan a future that might be his if he continues his reckless path. At first, Nathan thinks this is fine because Gabe and Cass are alive, but Victor reminds him that two of their crew are dead, and that he might be too if he doesn’t make some changes. (Chapter 21)

3. Gabe and Cass explain that it is a safe, sacred, and inviolable ritual that has never been violated; however, Elk Head Woman is waiting to kill them, making it both situational and dramatic irony. (Chapter 22)

4. Gabe has just had a vision of himself and his friends learning to breakdance when they were younger; the dog’s name is Dancer, connecting Gabe to what is about to happen to him. Connectedly, Lewis’s dog, Harley, was trampled to death before he fell into Elk Head Woman’s sinister plot. (Chapter 24)

5. Nathan identifies with a cultural hero, Kuto’yisss”ko’maapii (Blood Clot Boy), who desires to right wrongs and save his people, but Mr. Massey shames this part of his identity by contemptuously remarking that “every young Indian thinks he’s Crazy Horse reborn.” (Chapter 25)

PART 3, CHAPTERS 27-31

Reading Check

1. Heart (Chapter 28)

2. New heroes (Chapters 30 and 31)

Short Answer

1. When Denorah sees the bones, she must confront her father’s guilt. Though she is not at fault for the massacre, she must accept the reality that she is the only one left who can take responsibility. (Chapter 31)

2. Putting aside her differences and taking responsibility for what has happened, Denorah steps between the gun and Elk Head Woman. Because Denny holds fire, the cycle rights itself with Elk Head Woman and her calf reborn. (Chapter 31)

3. Turning Nathan and Denorah into new legendary heroes and ending her story with a sign of respect to the Crow team implies that, just as it is possible to tell new stories and create new cultural heroes, it is possible for individuals to become their own version of a “good Indian.” (Chapter 31)