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Summary Of One Day Of Destruction Days Of Revolt Sparknotes

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Days of Theft, Days of Restoration
Attempts to assimilate Native Americans and destroy their culture are a recurrence throughout the history of the United States. Chris Hedges' main argument in the first chapter of his book Days of Destruction Days of Revolt is that, for Native Americans, reconnecting with the culture that was forcibly stolen from them, in this case Lakota culture, could be immensely healing and restorative. He proves his argument with the specific examples of Verlyn Long Wolf, Michael Red Cloud, Leonard Crow Dog, and Duane Brewer. Hedges uses the stories of these people to show how restorative it is to reconnect with the culture that was stolen from them.
The first example that Hedges uses to show the positive effects of culture is the story of Verlyn Long Wolf. It would be an understatement to say that she had a difficult life. The never ending successions of trauma that she endured no doubt contributed to her struggling with alcoholism. However, once she became sober, she started to attend Lakota rituals such as the Sun Dances. Long Wolf says that the first time she attended one of these ceremonies, she broke down crying because it resurfaced the …show more content…

His father refused to let him be taken into a boarding school and assimilated into white culture; instead, Crow Dog's father raised him to be a Lakota medicine man (Hedges 48). Crow Dog presided over religious ceremonies and sweat lodges for the American Indian Movement; he was the link between the activists and Native American culture, helping them reconnect with it. Lakota culture and spirituality were especially important for Crow Dog after his son's murder; it gave him the strength and honor to forgive his son's murderers (Hedges 48). Having such a strong connection with Lakota spirituality enabled him the strength to forgive even the most heinous of crimes and move past

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