The central idea is this book is that Junior must choose to be a "part-time Indian" because he wants to live a better life than the Indians on the reservation do. When he lives on the reservation, he is close to his family and friends, but he can't get a good education. He sees that people like his parents and sister, Mary, have experienced the death of their dreams by not getting off the reservation. He therefore chooses to attend school in the white town of Reardan, where he feels that he is misunderstood and ridiculed for being an Indian. In Junior's life, he simply can't entirely win—as he must choose between a limited life on the reservation and a life with misunderstanding and hostility (on the part of both whites and Indians on the reservation who feel he has shunned them) when he chooses to go off the reservation for school. In his quest for identity, he is always caught between two worlds.
The central idea in Alexie’s novel is evinced in Junior’s struggle for identity. Torn between his desire to maintain his cultural heritage and his aspirations for a better life through education, he becomes an object of derision and bullying at home on the Spokane reservation, as well as at his new school in Reardan. This either-or situation created by Alexie for Junior—either he can be an Indian or he can assimilate into White culture, but he cannot do both—fuels the novel’s main conflict. Junior does not feel as if he truly belongs in either culture and his efforts to fit in, both at home and at school, often fail. Ultimately, Junior realizes that he does not have to adhere to a single set of expectations and accepts that his differences, although they might always make him a bit of an outsider, are what make him unique and valuable as a person.
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