Native Americans in popular culture
The portrayal of Indigenous people of the Americas in popular culture has oscillated between the fascination with the noble savage who lives in harmony with nature, and the stereotype of the uncivilized Red Indian of the traditional Western genre.
In 1851, Charles Dickens wrote a scathingly sarcastic review in his weekly magazine, Household Words, of painter George Catlin's show of American Indians when it visited England.
Dickens' satire on Catlin and others like him who might find something to admire in the American Indians or African bushmen is a notable turning point in the history of the use of the phrase.
The concept of Native Americans living in harmony with nature was taken up in the 1960s by the hippie subculture and played a certain role in the formative phase of the environmentalist movement.
The so-called Legend of the Rainbow Warriors, an alleged Hopi prophecy foretelling environmental activism,[4] became popular, with most proponents unaware that the story is untrue, written as part of an evangelical Christian tract, and an attempt to destroy traditional Native religions.
[4] In the US cultural mainstream, negative depiction of Native Americans came to be seen as racist in the 1980s, as reflected in the production of western films emphasizing the "noble savage" such as Dances with Wolves (1990).
In the 1990s, DC Comics superhero Hawkman (Katar Hol) was depicted as being the son of a Thanagarian man and a Native American woman named Naomi Carter.
[6] Marvel Comics features many Native American superheroes including Thunderbird (John Proudstar), Warpath, Shaman, Talisman, Forge, Danielle Moonstar and Echo.
These include "Wovoka" by Redbone, "The Land is Your Mother" by Floyd Red Crow Westerman (Sisseton-Wapheton Dakota) and "Oil 4 Blood" by Frank Waln (Sicangu Lakota), among many others.
Most of the John Ford Westerns show respect toward American Indians, and they are the heroes of such major films as Broken Arrow (1950) and Dances With Wolves (1990).
[10] His short story "David Whicher" (1832) reacted to the Indian Removal Act of 1830, and popular literature that supported it by exploring peaceful multiethnic coexistence in the US.
The Honest Hearts DLC for Fallout New Vegas (2010) features three Native American tribes in a post-apocalyptic Zion National Park, Utah: the peaceful Sorrows and the courageous Dead Horses versus the cruel White Legs.
In Red Dead Redemption (2010), disaffected Native Americans form most of a gang led by Dutch Van Der Linde, a major antagonist of the game.
The prequel Red Dead Redemption 2 also features Native Americans in a more prominent role in the form of Wapiti Indians led by Rains Fall and including members such as his son Eagle Flies.
