Indian Education

“Once, she gave the class a spelling test but set me aside and gave me a test designed for junior high students. When I spelled all the words right, she crumpled up the paper and made me eat it.

‘You’ll learn respect,’ she said.”

In second grade, Junior is bullied not by his peers but by his white missionary teacher, Betty Towle, who persecutes him relentlessly due to his independent nature and defiant attitude. Passing a test intended for junior high students shows that Junior is already a gifted student. Indeed, this is what pushes Towle over the edge; his ability to excel even in a system not designed to support him challenges white supremacy, so she takes it as an affront. The episode is thus indicative of the systemic discrimination Junior endures just for being Indigenous—particularly Systemic Racism in the Indigenous Education System.

“In third grade, though, I stood alone in the corner, faced the wall, and waited for the punishment to end.

I’m still waiting.”

Throughout “Indian Education,” Junior implicitly compares his experiences to the current (and historical) experiences of his community. His lingering sense of punishment reflects not just a personal moment of shame or isolation but also the marginalization and oppression Indigenous communities have faced across generations.

“That was the year my father drank a gallon of vodka a day and the same year that my mother started two hundred different quilts but never finished any. They sat in separate, dark places in our HUD house and wept savagely.”

Though “Indian Education” does not focus on Junior’s homelife, this brief scene highlights the challenges that he and his family face. His father’s alcohol use is the first instance of addiction in the story and alludes to the broader prevalence of substance use disorders in Indigenous communities. In addition, Alexie’s use of the word “savagely” evokes “savage,” a derogatory term that was often applied to Indigenous Americans, again emphasizing the systemic discrimination his community faces and its dehumanizing effects; it is not Junior’s parents but their circumstances and their suffering, embodied in their tears, that are “savage.”

“Oh, do you remember those sweet, almost innocent choices that the Indian boys were forced to make?”

In fifth grade, Junior takes up basketball, while his cousin, Steven Ford, begins using chemical inhalants. The irony of Junior’s rhetorical question demonstrates the limited and often damaging choices available to Indigenous youth: By describing Steven’s “choice” as “sweet” and “almost innocent,” he shows how self-destructive decisions can seem like a form of agency in a life with few real options.

“That was Randy, my soon-to-be first and best friend, who taught me the most valuable lesson about living in the white world: Always throw the first punch.”

This is a key moment in Junior’s education about social survival, as Randy, an Indigenous boy from the predominantly white town of Springdale, teaches him that a show of strength is often necessary in a hostile environment. The phrase “always throw the first punch” is both literal advice, as it stops Stevie Flett from bullying Randy, and a metaphor for asserting oneself in a world that expects silence or submission from Indigenous youth.

“I leaned through the basement window of the HUD house and kissed the white girl who would later be raped by her foster-parent father, who was also white. They both lived on the reservation, though, and when the headlines and stories filled the papers later, not one word was made of their color.”

This passage demonstrates racist double standards in media narratives, which privilege and protect white identity while treating Indigenous identity as criminal or inherently suspect. By failing to mention the race of the rapist, the newspapers implicitly manipulate their audience into assuming that he is Indigenous since the sexual assault happened on a reservation.

“I kissed that white girl and when I opened my eyes, she was gone from the reservation, and when I opened my eyes, I was gone from the reservation, living in a farm town where a beautiful white girl asked my name.

‘Junior Polatkin,’ I said, and she laughed.

After that, no one spoke to me for another five hundred years.”

Kissing the white girl becomes a symbol of Junior leaving the reservation behind; it thus causes him deep internal conflict because he feels that he has betrayed his people, developing the theme of The Tension Between Cultural Identity and Assimilation. The phrase “no one spoke to me for another five hundred years” is an instance of hyperbole, evoking the cultural erasure of Indigenous communities since the beginning of European colonization.

“At the farm town junior high, in the boys’ bathroom, I could hear voices from the girls’ bathroom, nervous whispers of anorexia and bulimia. I could hear the white girls’ forced vomiting, a sound so familiar and natural to me after years of listening to my father’s hangovers.

‘Give me your lunch if you’re just going to throw it up,’ I said to one of those girls once.”

Alexie draws a parallel between the hidden suffering of the white girls at his new junior high school and the trauma within his own family: The girls’ “forced vomiting” and his father’s hangovers are symptoms of deeper societal issues. Nevertheless, Junior is acutely aware of the class disparity between the reservation and the mostly white junior high school: He and his family struggle to get enough to eat, while the girls’ eating disorders presume access to (and ability to waste) food, which Junior finds absurd.

“As my white friends revived me and prepared to take me to the emergency room where doctors would later diagnose my diabetes, the Chicano teacher ran up to us.

‘Hey,’ he said. ‘What's that boy been drinking? I know all about these Indian kids. They start drinking real young.’”

This scene reveals the sometimes-complex dynamics of racism: Junior is being helped by white friends, while a fellow person of color stereotypes him. The teacher ignores that Junior is in critical danger, falling back on a prejudiced stereotype of Indigenous men and ironically revealing how little he knows by claiming to “know all about” Indigenous children. This interpersonal racism takes place against a backdrop of systemic inequality, as evidenced by the delay in Junior’s diagnosis.

“Believe me, everything looks like a noose if you stare at it long enough.”

This aphorism captures the psychological burden of generational trauma within Junior’s community. Wally Jim dies by suicide, indicative of the hopelessness he must have felt. Junior and his tribe’s unspoken understanding of Wally’s motivations demonstrates the communal awareness of inherited pain, while outsiders, like the Washington state trooper, remain baffled.

“Last night I missed two free throws which would have won the game against the best team in the state. The farm town high school I play for is nicknamed the ‘Indians’ and I’m probably the only actual Indian to ever play for a team with such a mascot.

This morning I pick up the sports page and read the headline: INDIANS LOSE AGAIN.”

Alexie demonstrates how Indigenous culture and identity are often reduced to stereotypes, such as a mascot stripped of humanity and complexity. The many layers of irony—Junior playing for a team that has appropriated Indigenous identity, the unwitting double entendre of the headline, etc.—underscore the alienation and pain that this creates.

“I walked down the aisle, valedictorian of this farm town high school, and my cap doesn’t fit because I’ve grown my hair longer than it’s ever been. Later, I stand as the school board chairman recites my awards, accomplishments, and scholarships.”

This passage illustrates the tension between individual success and cultural alienation as Junior is publicly recognized by a school system that tried to erase his identity in so many ways. His hair is a symbol of his personal victory against cultural erasure: While Mrs. Towle tried to force him to cut his braids in second grade, he now proudly wears his hair long.

“Back home on the reservation, my former classmates graduate: a few can’t read, one or two are just given attendance diplomas, most look forward to the parties. The bright students are shaken, frightened, because they don’t know what comes next.”

Alexie juxtaposes Junior’s success as his class’s valedictorian with the results of his former classmates’ schooling on the reservation. This passage reveals how the educational system fails to provide many Indigenous students with skills and opportunities available to students educated off the reservation.