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CANADIAN LANDSCAPES/ PAYSAGES CANADIENS
[t]here aren’t many if any Native superheroes that are created by Native people.
The ones that have been out there stick to the stereotype with the leather and the
feathers and the shaman sidekick kind of thing. My guy’s not a sidekick. He’s the
main character, he’s carrying the show, and he’s Native. That just wasn’t out there.
It was strange to me that it wasn’t out there (Sutton, “Art Talk with Arigon Starr”).
CONCLUSION
Contemporary Indigenous authors and artists offer a vast array of works that
look to their ancestral heritage as the foundation of their emerging voices.
Stereotypes, native symbolism, and humour are the elements through which
these artists look toward the future in a global and transcultural world, in
which their aim is to step out of the shadows that have been cast on them and
strengthen their ancestral native identities through tools like literature and
the arts, which educate Indigenous youth and link Indigenous culture with the
contemporary world. Their aim is to assist people to better understand Indig¬
enous issues and talk about them openly. Their works are self-deprecating
humour at its best, which parallels a visual manifestation of gathering Abo¬
riginal awareness and confidence (Ryan 21). Since the 1980s time has shown
that critical satire is just one of the aesthetic strategies used by Indigenous
artists to interrogate history and illuminate contemporary experience. And as
for the future, the critical essays reveal a deepfelt optimism; Darrel J. McLeod
(writer, educator, activist) says: “Indigenous people have only just begun to
reclaim our space in the broader human context, and I’m filled with optimism
and hope about the future. Let’s paint it red” (21). As the Hopi proverb says,
“[a] smile is sacred.” Therefore, it is fitting to conclude with Don Kelly’s com¬
ment: “[p]eople who know Indigenous people will say to me, you guys are funny.
And if that’s a stereotype, I’ll take that one” (Howells, “These Indigenous
Comedians”).
WORKS CITED
Atwood, Margaret. “A Double-Bladed Knife, Subversive Laughter.” Native Writers and
Canadian Writing, edited by W. H. New, UBC Press, 1992, pp. 243-50.
Burnstick, Don. Cultural Diversity. “Laughter — Good Medicine”. San Carlos Apache Com¬
munity, 2009, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5_U32Uj-V4.
Deloria Jr., Vine. Custer Died for your Sins: An Indian Manifesto. Macmillan, 1969.
Gessell, Paul. “Laughing with the Trickster: Tomson Highway.” Fifty-Five Plus Lifestyle
Magazine, October 2022, https://www.fifty-five-plus.com/blog/entertainment/laughing¬
with-the-trickster-tomson-highway/.
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