Stanford Humanities Center
Jane Lord-Krause is a senior from Seattle, WA majoring in American Studies and Mathematics. She is writing her thesis about linguistic stereotypes of Native Americans in 1860s and ‘70s pulp fiction after being inspired by her sophomore year PWR (Program in Writing and Rhetoric) class in which she wrote about Black Elk Speaks. She loves hiking, road biking, skiing, sewing, reading, and going to Stanford sports games.
SHC Project
Linguistic Representations of Native Americans in Early Dime Novels
Advisors: Jennifer Johnson and Judith Richardson
What is the focus of your current research?
I am investigating the portrayal of Native American speech patterns in early “dime novels,” a popular genre of novel born in 1860 so named for their cost of only 10 cents. These novels often include Native Americans in grand narratives of the Wild West and can be seen as a precursor to the genre of Western films popular in the mid-1900s. Using the data I’ve gathered from these sources, I plan to connect the portrayal of American Indian English in white public space in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries to early accounts of and fiction about Native Americans from the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries.
What drew you to this topic?
When I read Black Elk Speaks in my American Studies seminar, certain linguistic choices made by the author John Neihardt struck me as, for lack of a better word, strange. I decided to investigate these linguistic oddities in my PWR class the following quarter. That project ignited my interest in linguistic representations of American Indians that motivated my desire to write a thesis.
How are you conducting your research?
I read thirty-two dime novels digitized by Northern Illinois University and analyzed these novels for linguistic stereotypes identified through my review of existing scholarly literature about linguistic stereotypes of Native Americans, relying heavily on Barbra Meek’s 2006 piece about Hollywood Injun English. Using both inductive and deductive methods to generate codes, I identified a variety of linguistic phenomena prolific in these novels among Native American characters. My data falls into two general categories: overly formal English and what I’ve termed Pulp Injun English. These categories are a microcosm for the paradox of the “Noble Savage”—the idea that somehow Native Americans are both inherently noble, connected with nature and morally superior with child-like innocence of European worldliness, but also inherently savage, violent, and uncivilized. Ultimately, I plan to connect the narrative of American Indian English through the lens of white public space in the twentieth century studied by Meek to dime novels and authors such as James Fenimore Cooper and Mary Rowlandson earlier in the nineteenth century.
What would people be surprised to learn about the topic you are working on?
When confronted with the idea of pulp fiction, many readers think about gritty detective novels, juvenile literature, or poorly written romance. People also tend to assume that the authorship of pulp fiction was exclusively men. However, women played in an integral role in the development of pulp fiction as a genre. The first dime novel was written by Ann S. Stephens, a prominent author and magazine editor of the period. Many other women also contributed novels to various publishing houses, writing on topics that ranged from romance to cowboy westerns.
In your view, why is it valuable to study this topic?
Although substantial research has been done on linguistic stereotypes of Native Americans in twentieth- and twenty-first-century media, little research currently exists on the origins of these linguistic stereotypes. Using dime novels as a bridge, my research addresses this current gap in scholarship, connecting research done by Barbra Meek, Kelsie Gillig, and others with some of the earliest texts written about Native Americans for the purposes of entertainment.
How is your honors thesis impacting you academically and/or personally?
During my sophomore year PWR class, I conducted original research analyzing linguistic stereotypes of Native Americans in the biography/novel Black Elk Speaks by John Neihardt. My thesis is the natural continuation of that project. Academically, this thesis is meaningful to me because it represents my first opportunity to contribute meaningful scholarship to a topic I have researched and with which I have worked for several years.
How do you anticipate the fellowship will be able to support your research?
I am excited by the scholarly peer group that our fellowship cohort has already formed. I feel incredibly lucky to get the opportunity to study in community with such interesting and knowledgeable classmates. I think the opportunity for peer review and discussion of ideas will be of enormous benefit to both my research and my personal development as a scholar.
