The Stories That Heal

The novel Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko has many messages thorough out it, and depending on who reads the novel, the more underlying messages that are discovered. Some of the obvious messages though include; healing through culture and story telling, the racism between Whites and the native Americans, P.T.S.D, racism between Native Americans, and even some sexism. For me I really feel a connection to the idea of story telling healing and the deeper parts of racism that really comes into the light in this novel.  Below I have put two of my favorite quotes from the novel, that ring with what I feel,  Silko is trying to get to in her story  of Tayo's tale.
1. The first is about story telling. After coming back from the war the main character, Tayo, is starting to see how stories will heal him with time. Before the war he don't totally understand how important stories where not just to his culture, but to himself. While suffering with his P.T.S.D., Tayo beings to see what his grandmother and other people in his culture meant with story telling and slowly without knowing it, it has began to heal him.
2. The second quote in about racism and was said the female character Night Swan, a woman who was both involved with Tayo and his uncle, Josiah. Nigh Swan, being of mixed blood herself, says this to Tayo who has been criticized his whole life for being a half breed and not full Native American, creating not only more racism with Whites, but within his Native culture. Although the novel points to the basic racism of all Native Americans and Whites, I think it beautiful how Silko includes the racism within a Native American group. What Night swan says here I feel is very true.  I think part of the reason humans have created racism is because we fear change. Whether we want to admit or not, humans are afraid of change and we lash out because we don't know how to handle that fear, creating think like racism. Silko does great within the novel making the reader see that with quotes like this one.

1. "Everywhere he looked, he saw a world made of stories, the long ago, time immemorial stories, as old Grandma called them. It was a world alive, always changing and moving; and if you knew where to look, you could see it, sometimes almost imperceptible, like the motion of the stars across the sky." (Silko pg.88)
2."'...most people are afraid of change. They think that if their children have the same color of skin, the same color of eyes, that nothing is changing.' She laughed softly. 'They are fools. They blame us, the ones who look different. That way they don't have to think about what has happened inside themselves.'" (Night Swan pg.92)