Assertion Analysis #7

"I am a red man. If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man he would have made me so in the first place. He put in your heart certain wishes and plans, in my heart he put other and different desires. Each man is good in his sight. It is not necessary for Eagles to be Crows. We are poor... but we are free. No white man controls our footsteps. If we must die...we die defending our rights." - Sitting Bull (Hunkpapa Lakota)

In this assertion Sitting Bull is talking about how he was born a native and how he doesn't plan on becoming a white man anytime soon. He believes that everyone has different beliefs and sometimes they do not necessarily understand each other. In his case the red man and the white man do not get along and he believes that if he, the great spirit in which he believes, would have made him a white man then maybe he would of wished to do the same as the white man does. But since he is a red man he doesn't quite like the ways of the white man and he chooses to not follow such orders from those he quite differs to. He was born a red man and he desires to stay that way. White men and Red men see things differently as they are very different people, but in their eyes the way they do things is always right, "each man is good in his sight." But then again Sitting Bull claims that they are both still very different, red man is red and a white man is white you can't turn white into red. The white and red man have different sights, opposite to one another, making it impossible for Sitting bull to become a white man. He will not let the white man take control of the red people because the life that the red man was living before the arrival of he white man was poor but free and in the society that the white man was creating, the red mans ideals would be crushed and changed. And if the white man wants to kill the red man if they don't follow under their command, Sitting Bull declares that they would rather die defending their rights. 

Siting Bull gets straight to the point in his first statement, making it concise and simple so everyone who'd read or hear it would understand, "I am a red man." He first makes his statement, then later explains what it is he means throughout his assertion. He also uses an extended metaphor using it to describe the situation the white and red man are in by making a comparison of eagles and crows. There is also a shift in his quotation. He first starts by using a lot of "I's" he is only talking about one individual, about himself, but near he end of his quotation, after making his comparison of the eagles and crows, he starts to say "we." He went from speaking only about himself to speaking about all the red people, about all his naive brothers and sisters.