Neither Wolf Nor Dog: by Kent Nerburn
Conversations with an Indian Elder.
From the cover:
Against an unflinching backdrop of 1990s reservation life and the majestic spaces of the western Dakotas, Neither Wolf nor Dog tells the story of two men, one white and one Indian, locked in their own understandings yet struggling to find a common voice. In this award-winning book, acclaimed author Kent Nerburn draws us deep into the world of a Native American elder named Dan, who leads Kent through Indian towns and down forgotten roads that swirl with the memories of the Ghost Dance and Sitting Bull. Along the way we meet a vivid cast of characters - ranging from Jumbo, a 400-pound mechanic, to Annie, an eighty-year-old Lakota woman living in a log cabin with no running water. Neither Wolf nor Dog takes us past the myths and stereotypes of the Native American experience, revealing an America few ever see.
Why should you read this book?
Neither Wolf nor Dog is a conversation between a white man and an Indian elder. These conversations break through the barrier between two different cultures. Cultures that often clash with one another. It’s these types of conversations that help us better understand one another. It’s not about who is right or wrong, but empathizing and learning from someone who’s different from us.
Excerpts:
One day Dan startled me with a full sentence. "You’re getting better with silence,” he said.
"I am?"
"I watch you."
"I know."
"You're learning. I can tell because of your silence." I sensed that he had something to say. Dan did not make small talk when he was on his hill.
"We Indians know about silence," he said. "We aren't afraid of it. In fact, to us it is more powerful than words."
I nodded in agreement.
"Our elders were schooled in the ways of silence, and they passed that along to us. Watch, listen, and then act, they told us. This is the way to live.
"Watch the animals to see how they care for their young. Watch the elders to see how they behave. Watch the white man to see what he wants. Always watch first, with a still heart and mind, then you will learn. When you have watched enough, then you can act."
There was a silence.
"That's quite a bit different from our way," I volunteered, hoping to prod him into further conversation.
"Yes," he said. "With you it is just the opposite. You learn by talking. You reward the kids who talk the most in school. At your parties everyone is trying to talk. In your work you are always having meetings where everyone interrupts everyone else and everyone talks five, ten, or a hundred times. You say it is working out a problem. To us it just sounds like a bunch of people saying anything that comes into their heads and then trying to make what they say come around to something that makes sense.
"Indians have known this for a long time. We like to use it on you. We know that when you are in a room and it is quiet you get nervous. You have to fill the space with sound. So you talk right away, before you even know what you are going to say.
"Our elders told us this was the best way to deal with white people. Be silent until they get nervous, then they will start talking. They will keep talking, and if you stay silent, they will say too much. Then you will be able to see into their hearts and know what they really mean. Then you will know what to do."
"I imagine it works," I said. I knew full well it did; my students had used the same trick on me, and it had taken me months to catch on.
"It works, all right," the old man said. "But it causes problems, too. I remember as a little boy in school. When the teacher would call on me I would sometimes want to think about my answer. She would get nervous and tap her ruler on the desk. Then shed get angry at me and ask me if maybe I didn't hear her or if the cat got my tongue.
"How was I supposed to think up my answer when I could see her getting upset and nervous and knew that the longer I waited the worse it would be? I'd end up saying one word or, 'I don't know.' I'd say anything to get her away from me. Pretty soon they said I was stupid.
"I remember one teacher telling me I needed to learn how to think. She really didn't care about my thinking. She just wanted me to talk. She thought talking meant thinking. She was never going to be happy unless I started talking the second she called on me. And the longer I talked, the happier she would be. It didn't even matter what I said. I was just supposed to talk.
"I wouldn't do it. I thought it was disrespectful to talk when I didn't have anything to say. They said I was a bad student and that I was dumb.
"Now I see the same thing happening to my little great grandchildren. Their teachers say they don’t pay attention because they don’t look at the teacher’s eyes all the time and they say they aren’t very smart because they don’t talk all the time.
“I know what they are really doing. They don’t look at the teacher’s eyes because they are trying to form their thoughts. They are just being respectful in the way we teach them, because for us it is respect to keep your eyes down when someone more important is talking. If the teachers would give them time to form their thoughts and let them do it inside their own minds, they would see that my great grandchildren are very smart. But the teachers don’t think like us. They want everyone connected to everyone else by words and looks. They don’t like silence and they don’t like empty space.”
“Like the pioneers didn’t like the empty space of the land,” I said.
Dan brightened perceptibly. “Exactly! You’re starting to understand.” I glowed inwardly and kept listening.
Dan continued, "This is a lot of the reason why we Indians make white people nervous, Nerburn. White people like to argue. They don't even let each other finish sentences. They are always interrupting and saying, 'Well, I think...'
"To Indians this is very disrespectful and even very stupid. If you start talking, I'm not going to interrupt you. I will listen. Maybe I will stop listening if I don't like what you are saying.
But I won't interrupt you.
"When you are done I will make my decision on what you said, but I won't tell you if I disagree with you unless it is important. Otherwise I will just be quiet and go away. You have told me what I need to know. There is nothing more to say.
"But this isn't enough for most white people. They want me to tell them what I think about what they are thinking, and if they don't agree with me, they want to talk more and try to convince me.
“You don’t convince anyone by arguing. People make their decisions in their heart. Talk doesn’t touch my heart.
“People should think of their words like seeds. They should plant them, then let them grow in silence. Our old people taught us that the earth is always speaking to us, but that we have to be silent to hear her.
“I try to be that way. I taught my children to be that way.”
He swept his hand across the panorama in front of us.
“Do you hear the sound of the prairie? That is a great sound. But when I’m talking I can’t hear it.
“There are lots of voices besides ours, Nerburn. Lots of voices.”
“Your way teaches people to want, want, want. What you have is no good. What you don’t have is new and better…
In the old days we never had locks on our doors. There was no stealing, but if someone was hungry, they could go in your house and get food. That was all. Why didn’t people take things? Because of respect…
“You give nothing away unless you can get something in return. Everything is economic.
“Your most powerful people don’t even hide their thinking on this. If you ask for something, they don’t ask whether you need it; they say, ‘What’s in it for me?”
“I’m afraid that’s America Dan,” I said.
He hammered the air with his gnarled fist.
“I know it. And a lot of our people have started to act like that, too. Not all, but enough. This kills the old Indian way, where everything was shared. We believed that everything was a gift, and that a good man or woman shared those gifts. Next to bravery, generosity was the most important.
“Now we have been turned around. We think that good people should be rewarded, just like the white man thinks. Can’t you see how much better it was when good people thought they should give, not that they should get?
“We didn’t measure people by rich or poor. We didn’t know how. When times were good everyone was rich. When times were bad everyone was poor. We measured people by how they shared.”
About the Author
Kent Michael Nerburn is an American author. He has published 16 books of creative non-fiction and essays, focusing on Native American and American culture and general spirituality. He won a Minnesota Book Award in 1995 for Neither Wolf Nor Dog and again in 2010 for The Wolf At Twilight.