Native Anericans?

"A nation that does not know its history has no future."
-Russel Means, "How Hollywood Stereotyped the Native Americans" video. Seeing this video, as well as reading the chapter from Cultural Studies: Postcolonialism, African-American Criticism and Queer Theory and understanding and analyzing Caliban’s character in the second and third acts of Shakespeare’s, The Tempest, this quote comes to life. This video portrayed to me the fact that white males have always been and most likely will always be portrayed as the ‘hero,’ in a sense. The video elaborates on the chapter from Cultural Studies, especially when it discusses the hegemony of a culture being predominately white males. “For people of color… Native Americans, females, gays and lesbians, and a host of others, the traditional answer has already been articulated by the dominant class and its accompanying hegemony: silence. Live quietly, work quietly, think quietly.” In this, the author is trying to convey the idea that minority groups (meaning all but Anglo-Saxon males) are just manipulated by the dominate class, and therefore have no little or no status in society. To tie this in with The Tempest, in the first act, we learn that Caliban believes that “This island is [his] by Sycorax, [his] mother,” but as we know, he serves as Prospero’s servant. In the second scene of Act II, Caliban is victim of torment and teasing by Trinculo, the jester from the shipwreck. Caliban would be a native to the island, and should have rights, but we see this is not true. Caliban is subject to being tormented because the others, the white males of the situation, feel they have the right to do so. By doing this, Shakespeare is exemplifying the postcolonial beliefs that are discussed in chapter ten of the book, as well as the “Native Americans” video.