TA NA E KA by Mary whitbird is about a girl named Mary who is part of an indian tribe and she is going to take the TA NA E KA ritual with her cousin in a few days. TA NA E KA is a survival test and their grandfather teaches them how to survive beforehand. Mary has an idea and asks her teacher for five dollars. After some talking, the teachers give Mary the money. When Mary and her cousin Roger get sent into the wilderness, Mary decides to go to a restaurant and eat some food, then she goes into the bathroom and sleeps inside there. Mary is woken by the restaurant owner and she tells him everything and because Ernie is a kind man, he gives her food for the rest of the days until she has to go back. Her relatives are skeptical when she comes back because she is the same and not like her brother who is in bad shape. Mary eventually explains everything and her grandfather admits that she is more aware of the modern world and thinks she is going to do well in life. This story teaches us about tradition and how it conflicts with the change in modern civilization so we can balance these two ideas.
Tradition is important to help us pass knowledge and meaning through generations of people. It is part of our cultural heritage which helps us preserve our identity and understand more about your culture. In the short story, Mary learned that she actually did care about the ritual TA NA E KA even when before, she thought it was silly. The grandfather keeps on saying how important this ritual was to the tribe so he still wears tribal clothes and speaks his native language. This reflects how big of an impact tradition can have on some people. At the end, Mary finally realizes how important TA NA E KA was to develop her heritage. While Mary questions some of the aspects of TA NA E KA, at the end, she tries to appreciate TA NA E KA and respect it as part of her culture. Through traditions like this, we can learn more about our community and allow us to keep the identity of our society.
Change in society is inevitable and should not be put down, but instead encouraged so we can better develop. There is usually a conflict between change and tradition but rather than completely abandon either of them, we can alter one of them to adapt to modern society. Before, the tradition of TA NA E KA was so much harder then recent times because back then, they had to fight other people so the survival test had to be harsher to make it so that when the people come back from the woods, they are able to fight and survive against their enemies. Nowadays, TA NA E KA is shorter, and the chance of dying to an enemy is lower but this test can still enhance your survival skills. Mary, on the other hand, knows more about modern society and she didn’t try and find her own food like she was supposed to. She went to a restaurant and got her own food while learning more about her culture from her friend Ernie that she makes. The past and present form of the ritual has shaped itself to encircle the way modern society works in the present. Society is constantly changing and cannot be escaped, we can take it as an opportunity rather than a threat to help our traditions transform.
Achieving balance is the key to two things that conflict with each other. A compromise is a solution that although might not be the best answer to each of the problems, it can solve both problems pretty well. In the story, the ancient tradition of TA-NA-E-KA was conflicting with the change of modern society from the primitive ways of survival. Mary showed that although she had to go through TA-NA-E-KA, she used her knowledge of the changing community to her advantage and live better in a restaurant. No one in her family really understood their changing environment except her and her compromise was to do TA-NA-E-KA but use her special knowledge too. By adapting the old form of the event but not compromising the spirit, Mary solved both of her problems even though she was just a young girl. In the present world, we will have different rules or customs than before but what we should do is find a balanced path through thoughtful compromise so that our traditions can evolve to meet the needs of modern times.
TA-NA-E-KA by Mary Whitebird is a very compelling story about a young girl named Mary who learns from her tradition and changes to make a compromise. Traditions are part of the culture of who you are and what you believe in. Tradition helps pass knowledge down to our young so then they can keep this knowledge and tell it to their children and so on. Society is constantly changing due to new discoveries and so, it is inevitable but instead of trying to avoid it, you can embrace it and use it to your advantage. Old traditions and the constant change in society can be difficult to keep together so a compromise is made that allows the ancient traditions of our ancestors and the change in society to co-exist. TA-NA-E-KA by Mary Whitebird actually teaches us to respect our own heritage and the changing society could conflict with this so we can make a compromise to suit both of these.
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