Green Grass Running Water Analysis

Green Grass Running Water is a novel written by Thomas King in which he explores the implications that colonization has on Indigenous people in a post colonial context. Colonization is a continuous process in which an empire acquires and maintains power by having an unequal relationship with a group of people while taking over their land. In King’s novel he emphasizes that colonization is an ongoing process. Even in a post colonial land, Indigenous people are still being oppressed by their colonizers. One really powerful tactic that oppressors use to maintain the unequal power dynamic is demonstrating a Western norm through pop culture. Western pop culture valourizes the lives of white individuals, which is demonstrated in the heroism in which John Wayne is seen. Doing this enforces the ideology of white supremacy over Indigenous people by having them their after internalize their oppression. In this novel King demonstrates how colonizers are able to maintain their hegemonic control of the individuals they have colonized by having them try to reach the western cultural norms demonstrated through pop culture.

Throughout the novel many references are made to John Wayne, a famous american actor who often played a heroic cowboy in films. Throughout the text John Wayne is idolized in
It is also important to realize that this is the only film on at the time therefore the Western pop culture is being forced upon them without any choice. Western culture has developed so much to the extent that the oppressed have learned that there is no value in questioning what is now perceived as normal. Western culture makes the Indigenous people in the novel feel powerless as if there is nothing they can do to change the society that was forced upon them. When Charlie is watching the Western film his experience is different then the experience of Latisha and her