50 pages • 1 hour read
Oscar HokeahCalling for a Blanket Dance
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2022A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
The Gourd Dance, Powwows, and Ceremonial Regalia
Powwows, and the Gourd Dance in particular, are a motif that speaks to the themes of Resilience and Family Bonds and Identity Development, but also suggests the possibility of healing from trauma. Ever’s grandfather Vincent, after he commits to sobriety, introduces Ever and his cousin Quinton to their Kiowa heritage through participation in powwows, the Gourd Dance, and through wearing the ceremonial regalia that he and Turtle sew for the boys. He helps his young grandsons to develop a sense of cultural identity. Through the pride that they take in their Kiowa beliefs, values, and traditions, they learn to take pride in themselves. For Vincent, too, powwows are sites of redemption and healing: It is only late in his life that he gives up drinking and diverts his energy into his grandchildren’s cultural development. Vincent thus heals himself by helping others, and that model will also become a rubric for Ever, who will ultimately find self-healing and redemption through his work with at-risk Indigenous boys. Powwows are described as “a place to be rescued, healed, given a second chance” (147), and multiple characters within the narrative find strength, healing, and redemption at powwows and through wearing traditional, ceremonial clothing.
When Vincent begins to take his grandchildren to powwows, they do not have the ceremonial clothing, “regalia” typically worn at such events. He enlists the help of his daughter to create sets of ceremonial regalia for Ever and Quinton, and although he worries that he is burdening his already overworked daughter, the two bond over the process. Vincent does not live long after the completion of the regalia, but both the clothing itself and the lessons taught to the boys while attending the powwows become a kind of cultural inheritance that they can make use of even after their grandfather’s death. The quilts sewn by Vincent’s wife Lena serve the same function in the family: They are traditional products imbued with symbolic meaning that bring strength and healing to the family, in this case Ever’s children, even after Lena has passed away. The broader suggestion in the way that Hokeah weaves traditional ceremony, dance, and clothing into this narrative is that Indigenous communities can find strength and healing in their communities, their family members, and through the revival of traditional beliefs, practices, and values.
Violence
Violence is another motif within the text, and it speaks to the theme of Generational Trauma. Everardo’s violent tendencies are in part the result of the beating he receives at the hands of border agents while returning from Mexico, an incident which permanently damage his kidneys. He does not seem to have the proper emotional tools to manage his post-traumatic stress, and he turns his rage on the members of his immediate family. Because he is violent towards his wife and children, Ever does not have a healthy role model, and he too finds himself prone to fits of rage early in his childhood. Ever does not understand the source of his anger, and although his grandmother Lena believes that it is in part due to his having witnessed his father’s beating when his young brain was not yet able to process what he was seeing, his use of violence as a stress-management and problem-solving technique can be understood as the result of having seen those behaviors in his father.
Even as an adolescent, Ever struggles to control his temper, and it is not until he joins the military that he can be observed forming healthy habits and coping strategies. In spite of his work to combat the generational trauma passed on to him in the form of this violence, his children also show signs of an inner rage, caused in part by their mother’s addiction. Ever’s adopted son Leander has also inherited the propensity for violence, and part of Ever’s own healing process will be helping Leander to heal. Leander in turn helps Ever’s biological children to find outlets for their angry energy other than fighting: He too models the role that community and family play in the healing process. Although violence in this text represents the difficulty of escaping generational trauma, Hokeah also depicts a roadmap for healing from that trauma, and ultimately the message in this story is one of hope and redemption.
Ever’s Broken Action Figures
In one of the novel’s early scenes that examines Ever’s childhood, he steals a set of action figures from one of the neighbor children, only to break the figures into pieces when an administrator from his school tries to force him back to class after his serial truancy. Ever’s broken action figures as well as his own daughter’s broken toys are symbols not only of Generational Trauma but of the way that such trauma takes root in the developing brain before the child has the ability to understand its sources or find the tools to process it. Ever shows this particular sign of trauma, but so does his daughter, who breaks her toys when she plays with them. She has inherited her father’s rage, and like young Ever she does not truly understand why she is so angry. Needing an outlet for that anger, both young people turn to violence. Such misdirected anger from young people is often an early sign of trauma, but in the under-resourced communities depicted in this narrative, many victims of childhood trauma slip through the cracks. Because of how common it is for young people to reach adulthood without having processed their traumatic experiences, they (like Everardo and Ever) pass this pain onto their children in the form of generational trauma. Both Ever and his daughter are shown to find ways of dealing with their trauma and healthy coping mechanisms. Hokeah thus uses this narrative not only to show his readers what trauma looks like in children, but also to suggest that healing is possible.
Cherokee Housing
The subsidized Cherokee housing sought after by both Turtle and Ever symbolizes not only hope and stability, but also the extent to which hope and stability are found within the spaces of Indigenous family and community. At the beginning of the narrative, a set of houses has been built on Cherokee land. Although there is a waiting list, they are available to a limited number of enrolled members of the tribe who sign up for them. Turtle first decides to sign up for a home after Everardo’s violence lands her in a shelter for women experiencing domestic abuse. To her family, the home thus represents not only safety and stability, but also self-determination. Turtle is a character defined in large part by her work ethic and her strong resolve to be a homeowner. Later, Ever too will set his sights on one of these Cherokee homes. At this point, the tribe is no longer building new homes, and they are much harder to obtain. He has to camp outside the office long before the sign-up period begins, and because of how long he must wait, he has the opportunity to speak with his fellow tribal members about their own experiences. There is a kind of solidarity that all of these friends and neighbors feel that bolsters Ever’s sense of communal identity, and he feels firmly sedimented within his Cherokee community at that time. That Ever is able to secure a home for himself and his family (his is the last number called when the office finally opens, and he receives the final allotted house) becomes the text’s final depiction of hope, strength, and resilience. Ever has found his identity in part through his commitment to helping members of his community and his immediate family, and he has found a home on Indigenous land.
