Growing up on a Native American Reservation with alcoholic parents, being bullied at school and having severe a health condition, the great writer Sherman Alexie somehow still managed to excel in his literature class and later be awarded a bachelor’s degree from Washington State University. However, filled with a dark, sharp sense of humor, Alexie’s work is still a subtle reflection of his youth. Written in 2003 and published by The New Yorker, “What you pawn I will redeem” is a slightly amusing yet insightful story in which Jackson Jackson, a homeless Spokane Indian man, embarks on an adventure to retrieve his grandmother’s regalia. By rendering the regalia as a sacred symbol of the perishing culture and Jackson’s journey to regain it as the process of salvaging his stray heritage, Alexie Sherman expresses the utmost importance of cultural property, to the Native American as an individual and to mankind as a whole.
Jackson’s acknowledgment that his grandmother’s lost regalia is now in possession of a white man and his determination to take up the quest of retrieving it metaphorically illustrate the tragic removal of Indian tribes from their traditional, ancestral land and their strong desire for having it back. Indeed, Jackson sees his deceased grandmother’s regalia in a pawnshop and he is almost immediately certain of it since “there will be one yellow bead hidden somewhere on it”. The pawnbroker then gives him “a crisp twenty-dollar bill” as a start of Jackson’s journey when he walks “out into the daylight to search for nine hundred and seventy-four more dollars”. According to Jackson and his friends, the loss of the regalia is “his family’s sad story”. Similarly, in the history of Indian, “removal was a tragedy as thousands of people were forced to leave behind their homes, livestock, crops, and places that had spiritual significance for them. The final removal came under the Indian Removal Act signed in September of 1830. Their travels were marked by outbreaks of cholera, inadequate supplies, bitter cold, and death from starvation and exhaustion”. Looking at the regalia, Jackson is now aware of a desire other than his usual thirst for alcohol. As a homeless man, he knows perfectly well that his chances to gain the enough money are slim. Thus, the future of his grandmother’s regalia, a tangible representation of his Indian culture, is unascertained. Plus, despite being sold for $999, the regalia has no real value to Jackson. However, its personal value alone is enough for Jackson to disregard all the uncertainties and the odds against him. His own name “Jackson” and the “crisp twenty-dollar bill” given by the “old white man” are also significant examples of symbolism in the story. Readers’ attention is called to the irony of the particular monetary denomination with President Andrew Jackson’s portrait on the front. The very name of the protagonist, again, forcefully reminds readers of the man who signed the Indian Removal Act in 1830 that brought nothing but sadness and misery to countless Indians, Jackson. White settlers perceive Indian life to be a roadblock to the development of the New World and consider their removal as the rightful course of action. “Trails of tears” were left as the Indian tribes are evicted from their natural landscape, and maybe, as the regalia was stolen from Jackson’s family.
The long arduous journey to regain the regalia and all obstacles, incidents, decisions that come with it further emphasizes the cultural significance of the dress and shows how meaningful this traditional attire is to Jackson. Jackson and his pals spend the money from the pawnshop owner on “three bottles of imagination” and end up passing out in an alley. When Jackson scrapes together another two dollars and fifty cents, he spends it on lottery tickets and miraculously wins one hundred dollars. But then he takes the money and buys round after round of shots for everyone in an Indian bar: “Me and all my cousins here are going to be drinking eighty shots.” Additionally, knowing about the stolen regalia, “the Big Boss” at Real Change tells him: “We should call the police” and Officer Williams says he will investigate the case himself. However, Jackson refuses both: “I don’t want to do that. It’s a quest now. I need to win it back by myself”. As the hours slip by, Jackson squanders his time and money – and perhaps any chance of redeeming his grandmother’s regalia. Clearly, the most prominent Indian stereotype – the ‘alcoholic Indian’ now hinders Jackson in his effort to reclaim his cultural legacy. Sherman Alexie, as a man who spent all his childhood with alcoholic Native American parents, accentuates this stereotype throughout the story. If not for heavy drinking habits, Jackson may not have become homeless and might have had an easier time recovering his grandmother’s lost regalia. With this example of symbolism, readers may wonder that without problematic substance use, may those Indians who are living below the poverty line, homeless and unemployed, have had a better chance in the contemporary world? However, regardless of how impossible it may be for him to raise $999 in one day, he is not one who cowers away from the fight. Twice in the story, third parties recommend that he could get the regalia back by reporting it to the police, but Jackson just turns a deaf ear to such suggestions: “I need to win it back by myself”. It is a positive element of the story that Jackson acknowledges the importance of heritage and ancestry by acknowledging that he can still choose to pursue a selfdirected goal.
At the mystically beautiful ending, as Jackson regains his grandmother’s regalia, puts it on and dances amid a frozen city, he successfully reclaims his heritage, even if for just one moment in time, thereby revealing an affirmation of goodness and humanity. At the very touching end of the story, Jackson finally recovers the regalia and he is, indeed, overcome with joy: “Outside, I wrapped myself in my grandmother’s regalia and breathed her in. I stepped off the sidewalk and into the intersection. Pedestrians stopped. Cars stopped. The city stopped. They all watched me dance with my grandmother. I was my grandmother, dancing”. According to the book “Children of the sun”, “there is, in fact, at least one dance group in almost every village, and some villages have more than one. They sing traditional songs and perform traditional dances. They also make and buy dancing regalia, which consists of button blankets (blue and red felt blankets embroidered with pearl-colored buttons in the shapes of traditional animal motifs), carved and woven hats, armband, carved knives, necklaces, and other jewelry.” Furthermore, according to the Meriam-Webster dictionary, “powwow” is “an American Indian ceremony (as for victory in war) or an American Indian social gathering or fair usually including competitive dancing” (Meriam-Webster). The dance is axiomatically the connection between Jackson and his ancestors. Jackson’s supernatural bond to his grandmother – “I was my grandmother, dancing” – demonstrates how he deeply values the regalia, the symbol of his culture because the very act of dancing is an Indian traditional expression of emotion. The regalia would have been worn during the Winter Spirit Dance, which was considered essential to the spiritual health of both the tribe and the individual. This brings final significance to the regalia – perhaps when he dances in it, he might fulfill the quest of his family, bring him spiritual wellness and honor his grandmother.
Following Jackson on his profoundly emotional journey, the reader could not help but marvel at the light Alexie Sherman sheds on the Native American’s life and how they genuinely worship their vanishing tradition. The regalia and everything revolves around it: Jackson, his adventure, etc. manifest one main theme which echoes down the ages: cultural heritage is spiritually imperative to humanity. This analysis has not considered Jackson’s interesting encounters with white people, which evoke a long, complicated relationship between Native peoples and white settlers. Such aspect might demonstrate how Alexie demolishes the preconceived notions and opinions of Indians about white people by showing that not all of them are evil people as some Indians may perceive them as.