The Searchers Sparknotes

“Subjugation Through Cinema: A Film Analysis of The Searchers”

In the 1956 Western film, The Searchers, John Wayne plays the role of Ethan Edwards - a lawless, headstrong, cowboy. Even before the murder of his family and the kidnapping of his nieces, sewn into his Confederate overcoat and welded into his Napoleonic sword are Ethan’s drive to conquer and his hatred for “the racial other”. Conceptualized by Toni Morrison in her book, Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination, the “othering” of non-white individuals is anything but marginal. In her analysis, language that acts like a dog whistle achieves the establishment of the racial other. It sends powerful subliminal messages to minorities that can “evoke and enforce hidden

In The Searchers, Indigenous American characters lack the development of personalities and positive identifiable traits. The Comanche are only viewed favorably for the laugh track they provide to the white characters harming them. Critically, the Comanche occupy a subservient role to white characters in the film’s racial hierarchy. Throughout history, mass media tends to reinforce the power of the racially dominant group (white people) by arousing the general public with antagonistic images of minority groups. For example, Birth of a Nation utilized white actors in blackface to characterize African Americans as “savage, ignorant, thieves, interlopers and potential rapists” (Luther). The use of blackface to vilify African Americans sent a subconscious message to public viewers that the white race was morally superior and the sole group capable enough to take part in mainstream media. Birth of a Nation, an infamous white supremacist film, draws parallels to tactics used in The Searchers. For instance, white actors were used in part to play Indigenous Americans and to act out the violent characterization and dehumanization of minorities. The Searchers made a mockery out of Indigenous Americans and repeatedly belittled them. Although white characters also commit violent actions, only the minority characters are villainized for parallel actions. Essentially, The Searchers abused the power that films hold in how they shape, and are shaped by, contemporary society’s opinions of a particular