"Dirty Rice" and the Act of Naming

Previously, I wrote about Gemar and Mike's visit to the Louisiana State Capitol in Gerald Duff's book Dirty Rice: A Season in the Evangeline League. For this post, I would like to continue part of that conversation; specifically, I want to touch on the act of "naming" in the novel and on Gemar's attempts to navigate the racial landscape that surrounds him after he leaves the Alabama-Coushatta Tribe and heads to Louisiana to play baseball. As Gemar's play on the field begins to draw attention, he inevitably encounters individuals who want to label him and to name him every stereotype in the book.

Every player on the Rayne Rice Birds has a nickname. In fact, no player chose what his name would be; instead, the other players decided and after the "naming" nothing could be done to change it. Upon meeting Dynamite Dunn, the Rice Birds' catcher, Gemar intones that "he didn't call himself [Dynamite]" (18). Journalists, radio broadcasters, fans, and other players came up with the name to use it in stories about the team and in interactions with one another. Gemar continues by saying. "I never met but one or two players in my time in the Evangeline League who would call themselves by their nicknames. Both of them had something wrong with their thinking, too" (18). Early on, Gemar makes a point to let the reader know that names are important and that they carry meaning.  

After a game during the first home stand of the season, Tommy Grenier from the Rayne Tribune comes to the locker room and interviews Gemar for a story. Gemar observes, upon seeing Tommy, that his name does not fit him. Instead of an older man wearing a necktie and sweating profusely, Gemar thinks, "I would've though that the name Tommy was something you'd call a young white kid" (108). As Gemar thinks this, Tommy begins to construct a story that ultimately names Gemar and casts him in a stereotypical light. From the very title, Tommy's piece labels Gemar as something he is not. Gemar comments that the title, "Alabama Indian Tomahawks Cardinals," does not reflect who he is at all, namely that he is part of the Alabama-Coushatta Tribe, not an Alabama Indian. Later in the article, Tommy plays up the fact that Gemar is Native American; he writes, "He's called Chief by his teammates on the Rice Birds roster, . . . He depends on a fastball he calls his Thunder Bolt, mixed in with a curve named Snake Crawler. He was big poison to the Cardinal hitters, and he lets out an authentic Indian war whoop every time he sets a batter down" (emphasis added 109). Ultimately, according to Tommy, the Evangeline League better pay attention because "Big Chief Gemar Batiste is on the warpath, and he's hungry for strike-outs and scalps" (109).

Tommy's article reinforced readers' views of what a Native American should be. "It satisfied the way they wanted to see things," Tommy mentions, "It's a lot more interesting to believe a red man will let out a war whoop when he gets somebody out in a game then than it is to see the truth" (110).  People's preconceived notions of how a Native American like Gemar should act permeates Tommy's article. In many ways, Tommy performs the same act of naming that those like William Apess, David Walker, and Hosea Easton vociferously spoke out against in the early nineteenth century. Gemar continues by saying that he "learned early on in life to take advantage of the way the white folks liked to think about Indians" (110). In essence, Gemar learned to "wear the mask" just like Procter and Grant do in Gaines' works. However, even if Gemar lets himself believe what the white man says about him, he will never let himself truly believe it because "if you don't let yourself start believing you truly are the creature the white man wants you to think you are," he says, "you can get something out of acting the way they expect you to" (110). Gemar gets the ability to make a living during what the whites called the Great Depression and members of his tribe called normal by doing something he enjoys, playing baseball. Gemar allows for the perpetuation of the stereotypes in much the same way that Procter Lewis and Grant Wiggins do, to subvert them.

Concluding, there are numerous other instances of naming in Dirty Rice. The manager and the owners, after Gemar throws a no-hitter, want Gemar to play up his "Indianess" for the fans because his uniqueness will bring in more money. After the no-hitter, Dynamite Dunn and others take Gemar to a cockfight. Here, Gemar reflects on the idea of naming, finding himself drawn to an underdog fighter named Little Red from Alabam just because of the word "Alabam." That word, Gemar says, "was another case that shows how much it means what a living thing is called" (188). Regarding the names the names the chickens received from their owners, Gemar notes, "The naming of a fighting chicken wasn't meant to satisfy the chicken but the man who slapped it on him" (185). Naming works a way to establish control and power over a subject. Gemar feels this throughout the novel, and like the chickens in the cockpit, he plays along. However, unlike the chickens, he plays along because he knows how to navigate the space where he resides.

There is much more that could be said about this novel; however, I will leave that for the comments below. What do you think about the act of naming either in Dirty Rice or elsewhere? What do you see as Gemar's role in the act of naming and going along with it? These and other questions are ones that could be explored in greater detail.

Duff, Gerald. Dirty Rice: A Season in the Evangeline League. Lafayette: University of Louisiana at Lafayette Press, 2012. Print.

Rayne Rice Birds 1937