Is The Use Of Oral Tradition In Tall Hopi Basket By Leslie Marmon Silko

Whenever stories are told, a message is given, which may help to remember the past or frame the future. Storytelling is also a way to connect readers or listeners with past ideas and help them understand the different situations of their society. Leslie Marmon Silko can transmit and illustrate a blend of stories through the use of prose and poetry, which reflect her personal stories and experiences as well as different traditions of Native Americans. In her book, Silko tries to combine photography, poetry, and short stories to express her traditions and heritage. The use of different genres helps her to show how culture evolves and how it is in constant change. Besides that, she uses those forms of genre to convey the dynamics of oral storytelling

Besides that, Silko has used different contemporary poetic conventions, and the author is able to capture the oral culture of the Native Americans in a written form. Consequently, the author could join the oral tradition and the printed one into a new way of storytelling (198).

The book has a particular flow that conveys deeply personal stories of the author’s life together with history and myth. For example, the book starts with her memory of a “Tall Hopi Basket”. The story ends with a photograph of her grandmother holding Silko’s grandfather Hank. This suggests a narration that connects her recent and remote ancestors, her land, and her time (Salyer 1). Moreover, on the next pages, Aunt Susie helps Silko’s identity, which continues to be shaped throughout the book by the mythology of Laguna. Stories are her identity and her biography (1). Silko grew up in Laguna Pueblo in New Mexico and was there with Aunt Susie. Her Aunt is very educated and believes in schooling and books, but she enjoys telling oral stories because she is the last generation to pass down an entire culture by word of mouth (Rockwell 198). The story about