Mean Spirit

The state-sanctioned exploitation of Indigenous people, their land, and its resources is a theme that runs through much of Linda Hogan’s work. In this text, the exploitation of Indigenous people centers around oil rights. White men marry Osage women for their oil rights and wealth, the US government tries to separate the Osage people from their money, and meanwhile the oil boom is destroying the land.

To white men in Watona, “The women [are] business investments” (33). There are multiple instances in Mean Spirit of white men marrying Osage women for their money, which the men often mismanage. For example, the sheriff courts Lettie, and although he appears sincere in his affection for her, it is ultimately revealed that his desire to marry her was part of a broader plot to gain access to the oil reserves on her family’s land. Ruth’s white husband, Tate, has likewise married her for financial gain, as becomes apparent when he is discovered to be part of Hale’s gang. Nola, whose white husband does appear to truly love her, is nonetheless used for her money because her father-in-law withdraws sizeable sums from her accounts to invest them. Given the exploitation of Osage women around her, Nola can never be sure that her husband does not harbor secret malign intentions toward her, and the stress of not knowing ultimately drives her to fatally shoot him.

The Osage people are also exploited financially by the government and its management of land leases and oil profits. Men like John Hale are routinely allowed to underpay the Osage people for the right to lease their land, and John Hale uses his knowledge of the law and his contacts in the government to take further advantage of Belle Graycloud, twisting and bending the terms of his lease to build larger livestock enclosures on the property that he rents from her. The Osage people are subject to these exploitive practices because they lack the knowledge and political power to self-advocate, a reality made even clearer by the system of financial guardianship, which limits their access to their own money. Those who are deemed unfit to manage their own money are appointed “guardians,” who charge the Osage people exorbitant fees. At every turn, the Osage people are exploited by white people.

The exploitation of the Osage people is shown to be inextricably connected to the exploitation of the land itself. The Osage people realize that “It’s more than a race war: They are waging a war with earth. Our forests and cornfields are burned by them” (13). The discovery of oil on Osage land initially seems like a financial boon to the community, and yet it proves to be the source of not only exploitation and violence but a series of linked murders. In addition, the oil boom ultimately results in the destruction of the very environment it was supposed to help. Oil derricks abound on once-pristine land, but the oil also becomes an environmental disaster. When a string of fires break out, various characters note that it is the land’s way of protesting and of fighting back: “He was sure he heard the words behind the bush. It was the sound of earth speaking. It was the deep and dreaming voice of land” (186). The exploitation of people, resources, and the environment are connected and must be analyzed together.