DIALOGIC INCONGRUITY IN MOMADAY’S THE INDOLENT BOYS

Guillermo Bartelt

Abstract


From the perspective of interpretive sociolinguistics, this paper offers a stylistic assessment of dialogic incongruity in Scott Momaday’s play The Indolent Boys. The mismatches between utterances and the discursive context reflect the protagonist’s psychosocial fragmentation attributable to the consequences of forced assimilation. Employing an expanded ethnography-of-speaking approach which incorporates sociocultural as well as psychological meanings of the text, the analysis of selected conversational exchanges reveals the continued significant role mythic texts play in recovering and strengthening Native identities.

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Keywords


American Indian theater, cultural memory, forced acculturation, conflicted identity

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References


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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.46827/ejls.v3i1.299

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