American popular culture pervades not only America itself, but many other cultures as well, and says so much about the people and society as a whole that it attempts to define. American Indians are a group not usually connected to the web of popular culture in the way that many other American ethnic groups are included, but Native American authors of many affiliations attempt to bridge this distinction and show how they are just as much a part of the global world . society as everyone else is. In works like Thomas King's Truth and Bright Water and Leslie Marmon Silko's Storyteller, specific scenes reveal the way pop culture is very important in defining Native cultures. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay In King's Truth and Bright Water, many references are made to the strangeness of an outsider observing Indian country. Tecumseh comments on the way Monroe's hair looks when the two first meet; as if it seemed too quintessentially Indian to be normal. Tecumseh also seems to constantly have the idea of ​​automobiles and driving in his head, a concept that is not typically or traditionally "Native American", as many who mentally (and inaccurately) old-fashioned Indian culture might consider the primary mode of transportation be bareback. on horses rather than strapped into a Mustang. Additionally, Tecumseh makes constant references to films, musicals, and music from white American culture. The most striking pop culture image woven into this novel, however, is Lucy Rabbit's insistence that Marilyn Monroe is Indian: "Lucy likes to hold the picture [of Marilyn Monroe] close to her face" and compare herself to the famous icon. (19). The woman wants to look exactly like the star, but it is unclear why she does so; perhaps she is trying to eliminate her Indianness: “Well, you'd want to keep something like that a secret, now, wouldn't you,” Lucy says of the fact that Marilyn is Native American (19). The rest of her community also seems to consider the being Indian inferior to being white, as “Orange was a little weird at first, but why no one). otherwise in Truth or Bright Water the hair was close to that particular shade, in a way it made Lucy a celebrity” (10). While the references to someone outside the Native community are somewhat annoying and distant, Lucy's references to Marilyn Monroe being Native.” Cree or Ojibwa” (19) are actually uniting. His love for this icon shows acceptance and adoption of a culture as his own and challenges the whitewashed society of American popular culture by creating a new Indian icon. “Grandpa Graduated” by Leslie Marmon Silko. of the Sherman Institute” treats popular culture differently. In this very short story, Silko highlights his desire to fit into pop culture, at least in his grandfather's time. His grandfather, who attended a traditional Indian school, aspired to become a car designer, but was told that "Indians don't become car designers". He had to receive vocational training because, in popular culture and white society, Indians had no place in such fields. Because his grandfather was never able to pursue his passion and "there was a sadness that he never identified." However, his grandfather finds other ways to satisfy his desire to adapt to this culture, subscribing to magazines originally intended for white men, such as Motor Trend and Popular Mechanics. These magazines record the trends and constant evolution of popular culture; through these magazines, Silko's grandfather.