The Thanksgiving Play

Content Warning: This section discusses anti-Indigenous racism and the genocide of Indigenous Americans.

Although the word “woke” doesn’t appear in the text, this is undoubtedly a play about misguided “wokeness.” In the original African American Vernacular usage, “woke” simply means politically and culturally aware with no added sense of irony. However, as the characters in the play demonstrate, white-centered activism that is performed on behalf of an absent oppressed population is often ego-driven virtue signaling or, at its most sincere, a manifestation of white guilt. “White guilt” refers to the largely unproductive feelings of shame that many white people develop upon learning about systemic racism and how they as white people have benefitted from the oppression of BIPOC. In the play, Logan and Jaxton in particular embody white guilt, agonizing over how to perform cultural sensitivity “correctly” and fearing the backlash that could result from missteps. While acknowledging white privilege and feeling white guilt might seem like a good first step toward activism, the play suggests that they create a foundation that centers on easing white feelings.

More than that, Fasthorse’s characters leverage wokeness for social clout, effectively appropriating Indigenous oppression for their own gain.