User:State0312/sandbox

under Major Themes I want to add "Performance and Gender Roles"

When Unca decides to convert the Indians to Christianity the use of performance is important to note because the reader can visually see how Unca uses the body of a male cleric to promote her ability as a female missionary, a role usually designated to men. Before Unca’s performance, she describes the sun idol saying that, “The image itself, of gold, greatly exceeded human size: it resembled a man clad in a long rob or vest” (Winkfield 86). Kristianne Vaccaro is surely right in reference to this part when she says “what is most significant about the text’s—and, ultimately, about Unca’s—performance of these religious “truths” is that she herself cannot access them without first playing the role of male cleric” (Vaccaro 136). Unca uses the body of the sun idol to instill religious truths because she herself would not be able to do so as a female. Once the performance begins, the reader can clearly see how Unca has used the body of the sun idol to perform her duty as a female missionary. She narrates that “High-Priest. Did God send you to teach us? Answer. He brought me hear, and I will teach you.” (Winkfield 104). Unca has successfully convinced the Indians of her religious truths and has used the sun idol to her aid in establishing her authority not only over the Indians but the reader as well. Unca no longer refers to herself as Unca but “Answer” signaling that the reader can now take all that she says for truth because she has successfully transformed into her role as a female missionary. This performance was necessary because Unca could not assert her authority without first performing a role she was not physically in reality; the role of a male cleric. Unca’s performance allows her to move through genders fluidly and assert her authority as a female missionary to both the Indians and the reader. 

While this performance does help Unca to establish authority in this instance, the loss of Unca's voice towards the end of her narrative complicates her position as both a female authority figure and missionary. The Female American is no longer in the voice of Unca but “we” as she succumbs to marrying her white European cousin, they narrate “ As we never intended to have any more to do with Europe, captain Shore and my husband ordered the ship, by whom, for my father and mother’s satisfaction, I sent over these  adventures” (Winkfield 162). Unca has become a “we”, much different from her previous position as the “Answer” showing that once her cousin came back, societal gender roles were put back into play and it did not matter what Unca did to try and assert herself. She even changes her “history” into “adventures” because it is no longer a history about her life but her helping her husband, the missionary, in this new world. Unca may seem to be a trailblazer at the beginning of her narrative but only exposes herself to be a pawn used to “keep intact the social hierarchies from which [she] arises” (Vaccaro 150).