TITLE:
The Significance of the Natural World in The Education of Little Tree
AUTHORS:
Li-Ping Chang
KEYWORDS:
Nature, Animals, Ecological Views, Cherokee, Forrest Carter, The Education of Little Tree
JOURNAL NAME:
Advances in Literary Study,
Vol.2 No.2,
April
29,
2014
ABSTRACT:
Forrest Carter’s The Education of Little Tree (ELT) was published as a memoir in 1976. Carter died in 1979, but his book gained in popularity, to win the American Booksellers Association Book of the Year award in 1991 and became a national best seller. The book explores the significance of nature and animals in a traditional Native American worldview, even as it espouses ecological consciousness via the education of Little Tree by his Cherokee grandparents. The Education of Little Tree has much to offer in its presentation of a Native American philosophy of life that includes caring for the earth and its creatures as well as other people, regardless of their skin color or ethnicity. This article aims to examine the ecological values portrayed by the traditional Cherokee way of life as presented in The Education of Little Tree.