The Indians see that. They see it better than we do. And when they see it they don’t like it. They don’t know where in hell these "objective" anthros are at and it makes them suspicious, so they clam up and don’t say anything…
Or they’ll just tell them nonsense… which of course a lot of the anthros believe at first because they got it "objectively"… and the Indians sometimes laugh at them behind their backs.
Some of these anthropologists make big names for themselves in their departments, Dusenberry said, because they know all that jargon. But they really don’t know as much as they think they do. And they especially don’t like people who tell them so… which I do… He laughed.
So that’s why I’m not objective about Indians, he said. I believe in them and they believe in me and that makes all the difference. They’ve told me things they’ve said they never told any other white man because they know I’ll never use it against them. It’s a whole different way of relating to them. Indians first, anthropology second…
That limits me in a lot of ways. There’s so much I can’t say. But it’s better to know a lot and say little, I think, than know little and say a lot… don’t you agree? Because Phædrus was new to the English department Dusenberry took a curious interest in him. Dusenberry was curious about everything, and as he got to know Phædrus better the curiosity grew. Here to Dusenberry’s surprise was someone who seemed even more alienated than he was, someone who had done graduate work in Hindu philosophy at Benares, India, for God’s sake, and knew something about cultural differences. Most important, Phædrus seemed to have a very analytic mind.
That’s what I don’t have, Dusenberry had said. I know volumes about these people but I can’t structure it. I just don’t have that kind of mind.
So every chance he got he poured hours and hours of information about American Indians into Phædrus' ears, hoping to get back from him some overall structure, some picture of what it all meant in larger terms. Phædrus listened but he never had any answers.
Dusenberry was particularly concerned about Indian religion. He was sure it explained why the Indians were so slow in integrating into the surrounding white culture. He’d noticed that tribes with the strongest religious practices were the most backward by white standards and he wanted Phædrus to provide some theoretical support for this. Phædrus thought Dusenberry was probably right but couldn’t think of any theoretical support and thought the whole thesis was somewhat dull and academic. For more than a year Dusenberry never tried to correct this impression. He just kept on feeding information about Indians to Phædrus and getting back Phædrus' lack of ideas. But then, a few months before Phædrus was to leave Bozeman for another teaching job, Dusenberry said to him, There’s something I think I have to show you.
Where? Phædrus asked.
On the Northern Cheyenne reservation, down in Busby. Have you been there?
No, Phædrus said.
Well, it’s a wretched place but I’ve promised to take some students down and you should come along too. I want you to see a meeting of the Native American Church. The students won’t be going to it, but you should.
You’re going to convert me? Phædrus said facetiously.
Maybe, Dusenberry said.
Dusenberry explained that they would be sitting in a teepee all night long until sun-up. After midnight Phædrus could leave if he wanted, but before that no one was permitted to leave.
What do we do all night? Phædrus asked.
In the center of the teepee there will be a fire, and there will be ceremonies connected to it, and a lot of singing and drumming. Not much talking. After the meeting is over in the morning there’ll be a ceremonial meal.
Phædrus thought about it and then agreed and asked what the meal was like.
Dusenberry smiled with a kind of arch smile. He said, One time they were supposed to have the food, you know, from before the white men came. Blueberries and venison and all that and so what did they do? They broke out three cans of DelMonte corn and started opening all the cans with a can opener. I stood it as long as I could. Finally I told them "No! No! No! Not canned corn," and they laughed at me. They said, "Just like a white man. Has to have everything just right." Then after that, all night long they did everything the way I said and they thought that was an even bigger joke because now they weren’t only using white man’s corn they were having a white man run the ceremony. And they were all laughing at me. They’re always doing stuff like that. We just love each other. I just have the best time when I’m down there.
What’s the purpose of staying up all night? Phædrus asked.
Dusenberry looked at him meaningfully. Visions, he said.
From the fire?
There’s a sacramental food that you take that induces them. It’s called "peyote."
That was the first time Phædrus had ever heard the name. This was just before Leary and Alpert’s notoriety and the great age of hippies, trippers and flower children that peyote and its synthetic equivalent, LSD, helped to produce. Peyote back then was all but unknown to almost everyone except anthropologists and other specialists in Indian affairs.
In the tray of slips, just back of the ones on Dusenberry, was a section of slips on how the Indians had quietly brought peyote up from Mexico in the late nineteenth century, eating it to induce an altered mental state that they considered a form of religious communion. Dusenberry had indicated that Indians who used it regarded it as a quicker and surer way of arriving at the condition reached in the traditional vision quest where an Indian goes out into isolation and fasts and prays and meditates for days in the darkness of a sealed lodge until the Great Spirit reveals itself to him and takes over his life.
On one of his slips Phædrus had copied a reference that showed the similarity of the peyote experience to the old vision quest descriptions. According to the description it produces light-headedness, a state of well-being, and increased attention to all perceptions, sensations, and inner mental events.
Perceptual modifications follow, initially manifested by vivid and spontaneous visual imagery, which evolves to illusions and finally to visual hallucinations. Emotions are intensified, vary widely in content, and may include euphoria, apathy, serenity, or anxiety. The intellect is drawn to the analysis of complex realities or transcendental questions. Consciousness expands to include all these responses simultaneously. In later stages, following a large dose of a hallucinogen, a person may experience a feeling of union with nature associated with a dissolution of personal identity, engendering a state of beatitude or even ecstasy. A dissociative reaction, in which the subject loses contact with immediate reality, may also occur. A subject may experience abandonment of the body, may see elaborate visions, or feel the imminence of death, which could lead to terror and panic. The experience is determined by the person’s mental state, the structure of his or her personality, the physical setting, and cultural influences.
The source Phædrus had taken this material from concluded that current research and discussion are clouded by political and social issues, which since the 1960s has certainly been true. One slip noted that Dusenberry had been asked to testify before the Montana legislature on the matter. The president of the college had told him not to say anything, presumably to avoid political repercussions. Dusenberry complied, and told Phædrus later how guilty he felt about this.