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Cruelty and Kindness in Halfbreed
Halfbreed by Maria Campbell is an autobiography where Campbell describes the struggles of her life. Campbell's struggles center around her being a halfbreed, a half-Indian and half-white person, rejected by both the Indian and the white people. Cruelty and kindness are important themes of Campbell's story. Firstly, there is the human cruelty of discrimination, represented by the acts of the people. Secondly, there is the cruelty of society, where society oppresses people. Finally, it is a belief in human kindness that allows Campbell to overcome the struggles, with the writing of the autobiography an act of reaching out to the people who have discriminated against her and offering them the opportunity to understand the cruelty of their ways and choose to change these ways.
The first cruelty is that of the people, the people who discriminate against Campbell and treat her as an outcast. It is seen how both the Indians and the whites reject her and her people, leaving Campbell feeling like she does not belong anywhere. The outcome of this treatment is that the halfbreeds live in extreme poverty. Examples of this discrimination are presented throughout the book to show how discrimination was a part of life for the halfbreed and something they could never escape from. This begins in her childhood where she is treated as a social outcast at school. It continues to where her family are driven out of the church. Campbell also describes how people...
Their living conditions are also cruel, where they are forced to live in shacks along the road. This is human cruelty against the halfbreeds by a society that does not accept them as valuable. They are essentially treated not as people, but as animals, not worthy of a life like everyone else. Campbell's husband also shows how this complete lack of respect for the halfbreed leads to cruelty. Her husband is an abusive man who causes Campbell to have her children placed in foster homes and then leaves her. It is relevant that after Campbell is deserted by her husband, her only option is to turn to prostitution, effectively showing that the only value Campbell has is as a sexual object. While individual cruelty is a major part of the book, Campbell also recognizes that this cruelty gets its basis from society. People are cruel to halfbreeds, discriminating against them and treating them as unworthy people, but this attitude stems from the nature of society, not from the individuals being inherently cruel people.
Campbell shows that it is the basis of society that is responsible for the treatment of the halfbreeds. The halfbreeds are homeless because the government took their land from them, forcing them to live in poverty. Their culture was never accepted, instead they were expected to fit into the Canadian culture. This separated the halfbreeds from the rest of society, forcing them to be seen as…
Works Cited
Campbell, M. Halfbreed. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1973.
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