Ceremony: Betonie the Medicine Man Timeline PDF

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Summary

Professor Meghan Burns...

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Old Betonie: the Navajo medicine man (timeline presented in the order that it appears in the novel)

● Betonie is referenced in the beginning when Tayo is struggling; Auntie and Old Grandma talk about the medicine man and how he can help Tayo, but we haven’t met him yet ● Robert takes Tayo to Betonie’s place in Gallup, New Mexico where he lives in a hogan (pg 105) ● Betonie is an unorthodox medicine man ○ Part Mexican; has hazel eyes like Tayo ○ Connection to mixed blood narrative ● Tayo notices that the medicine man wears old clothes, keeps old things, and lives in a dilapidated home despite his relatively high status in the Native American community ○ Causes Tayo to think about how Native American success measures up against white success ● Tayo, Betonie, and Shush (Betonie’s child helper) ride to the Chuska Mountains to spend the night in a small hogan and perform a ceremony ● Old Betonie tells Tayo the coyote/bear story about Shush (pg 129) ● Old Betonie tells Tayo the story about how white people are created by witchery (pg 122) ● Old Betonie tells Tayo his origin story (pg 135) ○ Grandfather is Descheeny (old, wise) ○ Hunters find a Mexican girl hanging in a tree; they fear her and bring her to Descheeny ○ She doesn’t fit into societal category; as an outcast she can’t return from where she came, so Descheeny keeps her and takes her as his wife ○ She has a child (Betonie’s mother) ○ Betonie’s mother is taught to fear the Mexican woman ○ The Mexican woman’s daughter has a child (Betonie) ○ Betonie is taken from his mother raised by the other wives ○ Eventually the Mexican woman (Betonie’s grandmother) comes back and takes Betonie and he is raised by his Grandma

● At the end, Tayo walks away from Betonie; this is where he runs into Harley, Leroy, and Helen Jean ● Betonie offers a new perspective on white people and how they relative Native Americans’ struggle ○ Relates them to a larger issue/danger/scheme (the witchery) ● The ceremony: involves the cows, the stars (pg 217) ○ Betonie offers an untraditional perspective on ceremonies: thinks that they should evolve and change with time ○ New ceremonies are not like the old ones; old vs. new - ever-changing ■ Parallels Tayo’s life before and after the war...