Fools Crow Group 1 (last names A-H) by Megan M. https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc Choose any one question from the Fools Crow Guide OR write your own question and answer it in your post. **To do this, click "Add Column" and type the question there as your topic; then click "+" to start a thread. This allows others to add to your thread, or start a new thread on a different question. *You are absolutely welcome to mention and link to other sources, but be sure to discuss a specific moment in Fools Crow as you answer the question. Jump in and comment on each other's ideas, too! en-us 2019-01-30 13:28:03 UTC 2019-02-06 17:55:55 UTC hello@padlet.com megan_moosbrugger https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/325836181 Some of us were bothered by the treatment of women in some of our trickster stories. "Winyan-Shan Upside Down," for example, is a bit hard to read in the #metoo era, isn't it? What similar issues do we see in Fools Crow? For example, Yellow Kidney rapes a young girl during the raid on the Crow camp. This is probably the most difficult incident in the novel for me to process. By one interpretation, he is severely punished for this crime. He admits he "had taken her honor, her opportunity to die virtuously. I had taken the path traveled only by the meanest of scavengers. And so Old Man, as he created me, took away my life many many times and left me like this, worse than dead, to think of my transgression every day" (81). Notice how Yellow Kidney's language here resembles that of the "Great Spirit" story and its downtrodden Coyote figure. In this patriarchal culture (Old Man is the sole creator deity), do we have any evidence that men value women, or do they all simply use, exploit, and abuse them as Yellow Kidney does here?  ]]> 2019-01-30 14:15:24 UTC https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/325836181 telmamou https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/326023055 As I read through the chapters, I found it interesting how Welch changed character perspectives through which we can watch the story unfold in a very subtle tone. I could be reading a passage describing a scene or environment and it would quickly jump to another characters' perspective or view point of his part in the story. Thinking about this, and thinking about the dreams in correlation helped me understand that dreams have a more personal interpretation to the character having the dream. Therefore, it might relate to their struggles, weaknesses, or strengths regarding the moments they are presently going through in life, or may go through in the future. While some people in other societies may not lend too much thought or analysis concerning the dreams that they have, in the Pikuni tribe one can see that it was an everyday tool that is regularly used to help guide them through life.  Another aspect of dreams that they try to puzzle through is the metaphors that are assigned to them and how they can work through using it to their advantage in their everyday moments. Essentially, dreams are given a serious platform and are not discredited by other members of the tribe. They are respected, and given their due place.]]> 2019-01-30 20:00:48 UTC https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/326023055 drvgrant https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/326050588 What is important to the youth is power and wealth. That is all they really seek in the beginning chapters. The raid of the Crows really shows that. They want women, horses, and weapons.  They think having all this will make them wealthy and with that comes the women and power; all that a man needs... Fast Horse talks about how a lot of the girls' fathers won't allow their daughters to be with him because he is not wealthy. He says this because a lot of the girls find him attractive, and they could easily be potential wives. He tells White-Mans-Dog that he`ll get his wealth from the Crows. For the older members of the tribe, they value respect, pride, but value materialistic things and wealth in a sense that they signed away portions of their land in return for 'many goods' from the white man. To my understanding an individuals wealth is what they own and for what they have created. Power is how they are perceived in the tribe, whether that is how you carry yourself or your position in the tribe.The Lone Eaters are quite materialistic and desire things that will make them better, whether that is wealth, power, or both. ]]> 2019-01-30 21:17:26 UTC https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/326050588 kaymhens https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/326090781 I agree with Tasnim that the dreams hold a significant value among the characters of Fools Crow. I particularly noticed how they have a sort premonition quality to them. For example, White Man's Dog's dream about the "white faced girl" and it ended up being a warning about the dying girl with the white scabs that Yellow Kidney had sex with in the Crow camp, which eventually led to his torture with his fingers being cut off and getting the same sickness of the white scabs himself; effectively being punished for sleeping with her (as he interpreted it) and having to live worse off than if he had just died to begin with. 

I find the use of dreams in this book very interesting, as its a way for the Pikuni people to make meaning of things that happen to them ( or might happen to them) where they can talk to deities, such as Cold Maker or animals. These things coming from a European American viewpoint usually considered impossible outside of the realm of dreams. But then the book goes beyond just the realm of dreams to do this, as we see in chapter 6 when White Man's Dog goes to find the skunk bear in "the white man's trap" and to save him, per request of the crow. Here, the crow actually starts talking to him, but White Man's Dog is not dreaming. I feel like another purpose of the dreams thus far in the book is to get the reader, especially a reader from an outside perspective, to understand these things that happen in the dreams and their significance, but also to prepare them for actually happening in what we can assume as "real" or waking life. ]]> 2019-01-31 00:17:04 UTC https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/326090781 jlalcala https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/326104840 Welch tells the story of the Lone Eaters through the very masculine lens of the men in the tribe. To the men we follow, women appear to be little more than servants and potential wives. The rape scene where Yellow Kidney suddenly becomes aroused while hiding near a woman’s body is bizarre and severely off-putting, and I feel as if it does too much harm to justify its inclusion in the story. 
Our main protagonist White Man’s Crow is depicted simultaneously flustered and obsessed by women in his life, and struggles in understanding his relationships with them. It is difficult to understand the Lone Eaters full treatment of women as thus far we have only been given male perspectives, but based off those alone it can be argued that the men of the Lone Eaters have trouble viewing the women in their lives as fully realized people. 
]]> 2019-01-31 01:25:33 UTC https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/326104840 abigailkdegeyter https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/326117570 I see that women are immediately shown as a lower class citizen within the lone eater society. You see this from the beginning when the story is being told from a male perspective.  Women are not seen as much more than a home-maker or someone who is there to serve the present dominate male figure. While reading the disturbing scene of yellow kidney being aroused by a dead woman’s body, I found it first off very hard to read but secondly it showed the way they view women. Not as another human to be grieved over or mourned but an object to be aroused by. I also think Drew’s post also illustrate my point of women being seen as an object when they put women in the same list as something to be gained from raids along with wealth and power.]]> 2019-01-31 02:35:33 UTC https://padlet.com/megan_moosbrugger/vxotf3dexlbc/wish/326117570