The Yellow Woman Analysis

The history of the Yellow Woman myths is about a woman and the ka’tshina spirit. The girl in the story says that her grandfather liked to tell the story of Badger and Coyote that found a woman’s house when the sun was going down. It is said that she was living alone and told them that they could sleep with her. Coyote wanted be with her so he sent badger into a prairie-dog hole and blocked him in by putting rocks in front of the entrance. This story goes along the same lines as the Yellow Woman stories except it is very ambiguous and the woman in the story does not meet the normal criteria of the women in these stories. She is married, has a child and a family that she thinks will be worried about her and report her kidnapped. The woman

Throughout Silko’s version this woman, who isn’t addressed by any other name besides Yellow Woman, seems to want to be with the man that she claims mentally numerous times that has kidnapped her. In some instances it seems as though she went with the man she refers to as the ka’tshina spirit willingly. For instances, she leaves in search of food and instead of trying to escape she comes back to him while he is sleeping (1031, lines 10-23). In other instances he seems forceful with her like when she mentions that she doesn’t have to go with him and he points to her clothes basically not giving her the choice to leave him (1032, lines 6-9), causing a more ambiguous understanding of what may actually be going on throughout these interactions between the two. Another instance where confusion arises is when he seems to be giving her the option of going with him to sell meat in Marquez, but it is unsure if she actually has a choice or not (1034, lines 42-46). These interaction arise the question of whether she actually is living the Yellow Woman myth or if she just wants to be Yellow Woman so desperately because it is familiar to her and she needs an excuse to be someone else and put the blame of her transgressions on this other

While she is asking Silva if he knows the story of Yellow woman, she mentions that she does not have to leave with him stating, “What they tell in stories was real only then, back in time immemorial…” (1032, lines 7-8). The entire story is presented in an ambiguous manner causing the reader to assume that maybe this woman could be a little delusional and simply wanted to escape her responsibilities so she relied on what she knew, the Yellow Woman stories, to excuse her of her behaviors. The reader can assume that she is actually Yellow Women in her time or that she is making it up and both assumption would be acceptable. Silko made it very difficult to distinguish between which side is actually