Wing Young Huie and Margaret Atwood: A Study in Othering

Wing Young Huie "We Gave Them an Inch" Fargo, North Dakota (1999)

        Upon examining this Wing Young Huie photograph we see what appears to be a Native American man standing outside of a store with his arms crossed wearing a T-Shirt that reads "we gave them an inch and they took 5,000 miles" and has Native Americans on horses in traditional tribal wear. He has long hair, sunglasses, a few arm tattoos, scars, and two bracelets.

       Looking beyond the surface level, we see a man making a statement. The choices this man, clearly of Native American descent ("We gave them an inch") made as far as his appearance were not happenstance. His hair is long, similar to that of his ancestors, and his shirt is clearly anti-manifest destiny and the trail of tears. His facial expression shows that he is not laughing or making a joke of the matter. He is unhappy, not in every aspect of his life, but he is unhappy because of what happened to his people. Even though he may not have experienced what his ancestors did directly, he sees the result of it every day. North Dakota is a large plain with mountainous regions, land that belonged to the Sioux and many other Native tribes. He lives there, but not nearly similar to the way he would have without the westward expansion of the United States. In a society where western culture prevails, he is making the choice to be other.
        Margaret Atwood also presented the concept of 'othering' in her novel The Handmaid's Tale. Atwood did this through her use of language, illustrating Offred as the character who stood in contrast from society. Offred's diction shows that she is not an uneducated or complacent handmaid, and the way she is talked about and described by other characters affirms this. For example, when Offred describes the inside of her room she proclaims "My white curtains are like gauze bandages, hanging limp, glimmering in the aura cast by the search-light" (Atwood, 97). Huie presents 'othering' visually by contrasting the Native American man with his modern surroundings. His facial expression  and shirt tell the story without using any words. The black and white color of the photograph gives it a timeless, if not old feeling, regardless of the fact that it was taken in 1999. These two works take different approaches, but both effectively convey the concept of 'othering'.