House Made of Dawn

Use this activity to engage all types of learners, while requiring that they refer to and incorporate details from the text over the course of the activity.

“Visualizing Unity”

In this activity, students will explore unity within the novel by analyzing passages of House Made of Dawn and creating a visual representation that shows the relationships between Momaday’s style, themes, and messages.

In this activity, you will choose at least three passages from House Made of Dawn that demonstrate Momaday’s stylistic use of imagery, figurative language, repetition, or point of view. Once you determine how Momaday uses style to support theme and message, you will create a visual representation that illustrates unity—or the relationship between style, theme, and message—in House Made of Dawn.

• Step One: Brainstorm - Locate at least three short passages where elements of style support the novel’s themes.
• Step Two: Close Read - Annotate and analyze these passages to determine where and how Momaday’s style directly supports those themes. Determine the related messages that arise from these passages.
• Step Three: Create a Visual Representation - Using information from your close reading, create a visual representation that shows how style, theme, and message relate in these passages. Your visual representation could be a drawing, collage, infographic, text diagram, or slideshow.
• Step Four: Present - Informally present your visual to the class. Explain your thought processes and the meaning behind the choices in your representation.

Your visual representation may be displayed for public viewing. Once all students have finished presenting, consider any patterns in passage choices, messages, or visual representations, then reflect on the following: In what ways are these ideas connected? Is the relationship between style, theme, and message clearly demonstrated in all presentations? Why or why not?

Teaching Suggestion: Due to the abstract elements of the assignment, students may benefit from examples or a whole-class model or practice with a chosen passage first. Graphic organizers or annotation guides may help students less familiar with close reading delve deeper into the text. Remind students that “visual representation” does not necessarily require artwork, but could include infographics, text diagrams, or slideshows.    

Differentiation Suggestion: For students with organizational or executive functioning differences, graphic organizers or step guides may be beneficial. For multilingual learners, preselected and/or pre-highlighted passages may help with time management and ease transition from comprehension to analysis. To open this assignment up to more learning styles and cultures, consider allowing options for group work, performance art form such as film or animation, or oral response forms. To blend in elements of written style analysis, consider having students write “artist’s statements” that explain their choices and articulate the relationship between style, theme, and message in place of presentations.

Use these essay questions as writing and critical thinking exercises for all levels of writers, and to build their literary analysis skills by requiring textual references throughout the essay.

Differentiation Suggestion: For English learners or struggling writers, strategies that work well include graphic organizers, sentence frames or starters, group work, or oral responses.

Scaffolded Essay Questions

Student Prompt: Write a short (1-3 paragraph) response using one of the bulleted outlines below. Cite details from the text over the course of your response that serve as examples and support.

1. Though most of his relationships are with male figures, female figures also play a role in Abel’s character development.

• What role do female figures play in Abel’s character development? (topic sentence)
• Describe Abel’s relationships with Angela, Milly, and fat Josie. How do they reveal both internal and external conflicts related to Abel’s growth?
• In your concluding sentence or sentences, identify the role women play in developing one or more of the novel’s themes: The Power of Stories, Life After the Apocalypse, and Ritual, Witchcraft, and Whiteness.

2. House Made of Dawn can be read as a critique of assimilationist policies and attitudes.

• In what ways does the novel challenge the idea that assimilation into white/Western culture is both possible and desirable? (topic sentence)
• Describe how Abel’s, Tesomah’s, and Benally’s relationships with white culture illustrate fundamental problems with the idea of assimilation as a solution to the ongoing effects of colonization on Indigenous communities.
• In your concluding sentence or sentences, explain how Momaday presents a different solution to addressing the ongoing effects of colonization on Indigenous communities through the novel’s resolution.

3. Time is a motif within the novel, corresponding to major conflicts, themes, and events.  

• What roles does time play in both Abel’s character development and larger conflicts facing Indigenous communities during the period? (topic sentence)
• Explain how motifs related to time and natural cycles, such as the tides or dawn, dusk, and night, relate symbolically to Abel’s journey to heal from the traumas of colonization.
• In your concluding sentence or sentences, extrapolate what message this symbolism might reflect about Indigenous peoples’ journeys to heal from the traumas of colonization.

Full Essay Assignments

Student Prompt: Write a structured and well-developed essay. Include a thesis statement, at least three main points supported by textual details, and a conclusion.

1. One of the interesting paradoxes of House Made of Dawn is that as a narrative it is both fragmented and unified. How does Momaday achieve this balance within opposing structural elements? How does this balance support deeper messages both within the novel and about the literary status quo?

2. Relationships with the land and the eternal cycles of nature are motifs within the novel. What connections are there between the natural world and Indigenous identities? How does estrangement from the land contribute to characters’ estrangement from their identities and cultures in the wake of ongoing colonization? Is reconciliation and reintegration with the land and natural cycles possible for these characters? Why or why not?

3. Storytelling is presented within the novel as both a cause of characters’ alienation and its remedy. What role does storytelling play in the conflicts of the novel and its characters? How does Momaday use The Power of Stories to develop central conflicts relating to the impacts of colonization and as a device for exploring multiplicities within Indigenous and non-Indigenous identities? What power does storytelling hold for repairing relationships within the novel, and what might this suggest about relationships between societies?

Multiple Choice and Long Answer Questions create ideal opportunities for whole-text review, exams, or summative assessments.

Multiple Choice

1. In what ways is the opening scene symbolic?

A) The novel opens with running, signifying fear.

B) The novel open with descriptions of land, trivializing human problems.

C) The novel opens with a return home, representing the strength of our roots.

D) The novel opens with the dawn, signifying birth or rebirth.

2. What does Momaday’s choice to shift between characters and the past and the present emphasize?

A) The power of storytelling

B) The generational impacts of colonization

C) The blurred line between perception and reality

D) The effects of alienation

3. What is Angela’s internal conflict?

A) She is afraid of her pregnancy.

B) She does not love her husband.

C) She lacks direction.

D) She feels like an outsider.

4. What is Francisco’s internal conflict?

A) He is getting too old to work.

B) The world he remembers is dying.

C) He is ashamed of Abel.

D) The religion he believes in is isolating.

5. What do both Father Olguin and Angela connect to the Feast Day rituals?

A) Fear and depression

B) Witchcraft and tradition

C) Slaughter and sacrifice

D) Beauty and silence

6. What does the narrator’s observation that the domestic animals have no way of surviving and no foothold in the land reveal metaphorically about the colonizers that brought them?  

A) Colonizers couldn’t imagine living with the seasons.

B) Colonizers have no real connection to the land so their descendants will eventually go.

C) Colonizers and their animals spoil the wilderness.

D) The earth will outlast everyone, so the past does not matter.

7. How does Abel subvert Angel’s intentions?

A) He is slow to respond to her requests, undermining the idea that she is in control.

B) He chooses not to come inside the house.

C) He fails to give her a clear time of arrival for work, angering her.

D) He refuses her when she attempts to seduce him.

8. What is the impact of juxtaposing images of human dramas like the dance and murder beside descriptions of the land and seasons?

A) It underscores the differences between what matters and what does not.

B) It shows the role of setting and place.

C) It unifies temporal dramas within the eternal cycles.

D) It creates tension and conflict.

9. What advantage do Indigenous people have over Christians spiritually, according to Reverend Tesomah?

A) They have an ability to listen to the Word.

B) They have a truer sense of the Divine.

C) They are not jealous with the Creator.

D) They have a connection to the Sun.

10. What happens to Abel at the trial?

A) He pleads guilty to murder.

B) He is declared insane.

C) He finds himself unable to explain.

D) He is placed on probation.

11. Which word describes Tesomah’s attitude toward assimilation?

A) Resigned

B) Angry

C) Erudite

D) Positive

12. How does Abel meet Milly?

A) Milly is introduced to Abel by Benally.

B) Milly is the secretary at the factory where Abel and Benally work.

C) Milly is his parole officer.

D) Milly is a social worker with the Relocation program.

13. What is true about Benally, even though he wants to help Abel?

A) He cannot get over his jealousy of Abel’s relationship with Milly.

B) He cannot explain the nature of his struggles to social workers or parole people.

C) He cannot bring himself to contact Angela when Abel is hospitalized.

D) He cannot tolerate Abel’s dependence on alcohol.

14. What might Abel, Benally, and Tesomah reveal about assimilation programs?

A) They reveal differing Indigenous responses to assimilation.

B) They reveal reasons assimilation programs worked well.

C) They reveal how similar Indigenous experiences were in the Postwar Era.

D) They reveal that most of Abel’s struggles to assimilate stem from his military service.

15. What is the relationship between stories and memories, based on the novel’s resolution?

A) Stories keep memories alive by passing them on to others.

B) Stories are externalized and memories are internalized.

C) Stories and memories disappear with time.

D) Stories invalidate memories by turning them into fiction.

Long Answer

Compose a response of 2-3 sentences, incorporating textual details to support your response.

1. What roles does language play in Abel’s character development?

2. How does House Made of Dawn undermine dominant narratives of Indigenous people in the mainstream media of the period?