The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
Vocabulary 
Sherman Alexie charts a young boy's journey through his decimated American Indian culture on the reservation to an all-white school and asks how a heritage can be preserved in The Absolutely True Diary of A Part-Time Indian.

Chapters 1-7, Chapters 8-14, Chapters 15-21, Chapters 22-26, Chapters 27-29

Chapter 1 to 7

1. cerebral
   of or relating to the brain
   I was actually born with too much cerebral spinal fluid inside my skull.
2. lopsided
   having one side lower or smaller or lighter than the other
   My brain damage left me nearsighted in one eye and farsighted in the other, so my ugly glasses were all lopsided because my eyes were so lopsided.
3. seizure
   a sudden attack of a disease, often characterized by spasms
   But the thing is, I was having those seizures because I already had brain damage, so I was reopening wounds each time I seized.
4. susceptible
   yielding readily to or capable of
   I haven’t had a seizure in seven years, but the doctors tell me that I am “susceptible to seizure activity.”
5. impediment
   something immaterial that interferes with action or progress
   You wouldn’t think there is anything life threatening about speechimpediments, but let me tell you, there is nothing more dangerous than being a lad with a stutter and a lisp.
6. reservation
   a district that is set aside for particular purpose
   So I draw because I feel like it might be my only real chance to escape thereservation.
7. woe
   misery resulting from affliction
   And now I’m sure you’re asking, “Okay, okay, Mr. Hunger Artist, Mr. Mouth-Full-of-Words, Mr. Woe-Is-Me, Mr. Secret Recipe, what is the worst thing about being poor?”
8. whimper
   cry weakly or softly
   He whimpered in pain.
9. yelp
   bark in a high-pitched tone
   When I touched him, he yelped like crazy.
10. elder
    a person of more advanced age
    I was too young to deal blackjack at the casino, there were only about fifteen green grass lawns on the reservation (and none of their owners outsourced the mowing jobs), and the only paper route was owned by a tribal elder named Wally.
11. tsunami
    a cataclysm resulting from a destructive sea wave
    Tsunami mad.
12. perseverance
    persistent determination
    Poverty doesn’t give you strength or teach you lessons aboutperseverance.
13. depressed
    filled with melancholy and despondency
    After Oscar died, I was so depressed that I thought about crawling into a hole and disappearing forever.
14. brawl
    to quarrel noisily, angrily or disruptively
    This was the 127th annual one, and there would be singing, war dancing, gambling, storytelling, laughter, fry bread, hamburgers, hot dogs, arts and crafts, and plenty of alcoholic brawling.
15. persistent
    never-ceasing
    Rowdy isn’t a fast reader, but he’s persistent.
16. ambidextrous
    equally skillful with each hand
    I’m ambidextrous.
17. savior
    a person who rescues you from harm or danger
    prison-work farm for our liberal, white, vegetarian do-gooders and conservative, white missionary saviors.
18. supposedly
    believed or reputed to be the case
    Some of our teachers make us eat birdseed so we’ll feel closer to the earth, and other teachers hate birds because they are supposedly minions of the Devil.
19. minion
    a servile or fawning dependant
    Some of our teachers make us eat birdseed so we’ll feel closer to the earth, and other teachers hate birds because they are supposedly minions of the Devil.
20. decrepit
    worn and broken down by hard use
    And let me tell you, that old, old, old, decrepit geometry book hit my heart with the force of a nuclear bomb.
21. interrogate
    pose a series of questions to
    He was, like, interrogating me.
22. half-breed
    an offensive term for an offspring of parents of different races (especially of Caucasian and American Indian ancestry)
    Those romances always featured a love affair between a virginal white schoolteacher or preacher’s wife and a half-breed Indian warrior.
23. burden
    an onerous or difficult concern
    I was carrying the burden of my race, you know?
24. vow
    promise
    We all got really mad and vowed to kick their asses the next game.
25. tumor
    an abnormal new mass of tissue that serves no purpose
    “I’m as serious as a tumor.”

Chapter 8 to 14

1. pummel
   strike, usually with the fist
   I would have been pummeled.
2. mutilated
   having a part of the body crippled or disabled
   Mutilated.
3. stroll
   walk leisurely and with no apparent aim
   And pretty soon, a janitor opened the front door and all of the other kidsstrolled inside.
4. hustle
   move or cause to move energetically or busily
   I shoved the paperwork into my backpack and hustled down to my homeroom.
5. erect
   upright in position or posture
   I was emotionally erect.
6. stutter
   a speech disorder involving hesitations and repetitions
   And yes, I had that stutter and lisp, but I also had that singsong reservation accent that made everything I said sound like a bad poem.
7. bureau
   an administrative unit of government
   YOU MUST ALWAYS PICK FIGHTS WITH THE SONS AND/OR DAUGHTERS OF ANY INDIANS WHO WORK FOR THE BUREAU OF INDIAN AFFAIRS.
8. squaw
   an American Indian woman
   But I knew I’d have to put a stop to it eventually or I’d always be known as “Chief” or “Tonto” or “ Squaw Boy.”
9. metaphor
   a figure of speech that suggests a non-literal similarity
   And I don’t mean “kill” as in “ metaphor.”
10. strut
    walk with a lofty proud gait
    Roger the Giant and his gang of giants strutted over to me.
11. rowdy
    a cruel and brutal fellow
    I realized how much of my self-worth, my sense of safety, was based onRowdy’s fists.
12. impending
    close in time; about to occur
    I couldn’t sleep that night because I kept thinking about my impendingdoom.
13. rummage
    search haphazardly
    I got out of bed at dark-thirty, and rummaged around the kitchen for anything to eat.
14. uninterested
    having no care or curiosity in knowing
    She was out of my league, and even though I was only twelve, I knew that I’d be one of those guys who always fell in love with the unreachable, ungettable, and uninterested.
15. zilch
    a quantity of no importance
    Zilch.
16. petrify
    change into stone
    In geology class, the teacher, Mr. Dodge, was talking about the petrifiedwood forests near George, Washington, on the Columbia River, and how it was pretty amazing that wood could turn into rock.
17. articulate
    characterized by clear expressive language
    Yeah, I was so articulate.
18. contradict
    be in opposition to
    They couldn’t believe that I was contradicting a teacher.
19. snicker
    laugh quietly
    My classmates snickered.
20. delirious
    marked by uncontrolled excitement or emotion
    We should have all been delirious that she’d moved out of the basement.
21. tautology
    a statement that is necessarily true
    “Are you going to bore me with your tautologies all day or are you going to actually say something?”
22. illiterate
    not able to read or write
    I couldn’t ask Gordy because then he’d know I was an illiterate Indian idiot.
23. dilate
    become wider
    “Because your eyes dilated, your breathing rate increased a little bit, and you started to sweat.”
24. redundancy
    repetition of an act needlessly
    “It’s a redundancy.”
25. secede
    withdraw from an organization or polity
    One of those towns, called Poison, tried to secede (that means quit, I looked it up) from the rez.

Chapter 15 to 21

1. monotonous
   sounded or spoken in a tone unvarying in pitch
   But he was so boring and monotonous that he was only teaching us how to sleep with our eyes open.
2. mode
   a particular functioning condition or arrangement
   I’m in my Zen mode, trying to make this whole thing a spiritual experience.
3. subtle
   difficult to detect or grasp by the mind or analyze
   I can pick up on subtle clues.
4. gorge
   overeat or eat immodestly
   Penelope gorges on her pain and then throws it up and flushes it away.
5. ego
   an inflated feeling of pride in your superiority to others
   The girl has an ego.
6. disown
   prevent deliberately (as by making a will) from inheriting
   “Kid, if you get my daughter pregnant, if you make some charcoal babies, I’m going to disown her.
7. earnest
   characterized by a firm, humorless belief in one's opinions
   I wanted to make fun of her, but she was so earnest.
8. taut
   pulled or drawn tight
   Her leg muscles were stretched and taut.
9. clench
   squeeze together tightly
   And then Penelope clenched a fist and shouted, “Yes!”
10. distress
    extreme physical discomfort
    They’re damsels in distress.”
11. retroactive
    affecting things past
    It’s so retroactive that it’s radioactive!”
12. slacks
    (usually in the plural) pants for casual wear
    And I imagined that every girl was immediately breathless and horny at the sight of my bell-bottom slacks.
13. souvenir
    a reminder of past events
    A photograph would be just a lame souvenir.
14. ecstatic
    feeling great rapture or delight
    Penelope was ecstatic about the idea.
15. penultimate
    next to the last
    Roger’s nickname for Penelope was Penultimate.
16. repressed
    characterized by the suppression of impulses or emotions
    The Reardan lads were so worried about grades and sports and THEIR FUTURES that they sometimes acted like repressed middle-aged business dudes with cell phones stuck in their small intestines.
17. vice versa
    with the order reversed
    So quick guards had to guard power forwards, and vice versa.
18. intimidate
    compel or deter by or as if by threats
    And he was trying to intimidate me.
19. rabid
    marked by excessive enthusiasm for a cause or idea
    When our bus pulled into the high school parking lot, we were greeted by some rabid elementary school kids.
20. pelt
    attack and bombard with or as if with missiles
    They pelted our bus with snowballs.
21. contempt
    lack of respect accompanied by a feeling of intense dislike
    It was a fricking awesome display of contempt.
22. glare
    look at with a fixed gaze
    And he glared at me.
23. taunt
    harass with persistent criticism or carping
    They taunted me as I walked into the locker room.
24. endeavor
    a purposeful or industrious undertaking
    “The quality of a man’s life is in direct proportion to his commitment to excellence, regardless of his chosen field of endeavor.”
25. epic
    very imposing or impressive; surpassing the ordinary
    With an epic hangover, he just lay on his bed for hours.

Chapter 22 to 26

1. random
   lacking any definite plan or order or purpose
   I think she’s double crazy and random.
2. eccentric
   conspicuously or grossly unconventional or unusual
   Sure, my dad has a drinking problem and my mom can be a littleeccentric, but they make sacrifices for me.
3. binge
   an occasion for excessive eating or drinking
   I mean, yeah, my dad would sometimes go on a drinking binge and be gone for a week, but those white dads can completely disappear without ever leaving the living room.
4. shaman
   one acting as a medium between the visible and spirit worlds
   Epileptics were often shamans because people just assumed that God gave seizure-visions to the lucky ones.
5. wail
   emit long loud cries
   At the hospital, my mother wept and wailed.
6. grieve
   feel grief
   So they all waved the white flag that day and let me grieve in peace.
7. devastating
   physically or spiritually destructive
   It’s just devastating.”
8. anthropologist
   a social scientist specializing in the study of humanity
   Your anthropologist wasn’t much of an expert, either.
9. mull
   reflect deeply on a subject
   We all just sat there in silence as Ted mulled that over.
10. glorious
    having great beauty and splendor
    It was the most glorious noise I’d ever heard.
11. displace
    cause to move, usually with force or pressure
    And I realized that, sure, Indians were drunk and sad and displaced and crazy and mean, but, dang, we knew how to laugh.
12. endure
    face and withstand with courage
    How much loss were we supposed to endure?
13. distraught
    deeply agitated especially from emotion
    I mean, the thing is, Medea was so distraught by the world, and felt so betrayed, that she murdered her own kids.
14. slump
    assume a drooping posture or carriage
    I slumped into her class and sat in the back of the room.
15. spontaneous
    said or done without having been planned in advance
    A spontaneous demonstration.
16. revise
    reorganize, especially for the purpose of improving
    I keep writing and rewriting, drawing and redrawing, and rethinking andrevising and reediting.
17. totem
    emblem consisting of an object such as an animal or plant
    I mean, I’d always been the lowest Indian on the reservation totem pole—I wasn’t expected to be good so I wasn’t.
18. crusade
    exert oneself continuously or vigorously to gain an end
    In fact, my white fans were going to cheer for me like I was some kind ofcrusading warrior:
19. cavalry
    troops trained to fight on horseback
    Cavalry against other Indians.
20. primitive
    characteristic of an earlier ancestral type
    It made me feel exposed and primitive.
21. concussion
    injury to the brain caused by a blow
    He gave me a concussion that first game.
22. smirk
    smile affectedly or derisively
    Rowdy smirked at me as I took my position next to him.
23. demoralize
    lower someone's spirits; make downhearted
    I wanted to absolutely demoralize him.
24. adrenaline
    a secretion in response to stress, stimulating nerve action
    And I figured, with the crazy adrenaline coursing through my body, I might be able to jump over the rim again.
25. momentum
    an impelling force or strength
    One play can change your momentum forever.

​Chapter 27 to 29

1. destiny
   a course of events that will inevitably happen in the future
   Considering how many young Spokanes have died in car wrecks, I’m pretty sure it’s my destiny to die in a wreck, too.
2. merit
   be worthy or deserving
   I couldn’t think of anything I’d done that would merit punishment.
3. grief
   intense sorrow caused by loss of a loved one
   The grief didn’t hit me right away.
4. counsel
   give advice to
   She’d never counseled a student whose sibling had just died.
5. sibling
   a person's brother or sister
   She’d never counseled a student whose sibling had just died.
6. inspirational
   imparting a divine influence on the mind and soul
   The guidance office was filled with self-help books and inspirationalposters and SAT test books and college brochures and scholarship applications, and I knew that none of that, absolutely none of it, meant shit.
7. rhetorical
   emphasizing style at the expense of thought
   It was a rhetorical question, meaning there wasn’t supposed to be an answer, right?
8. vulnerable
   capable of being wounded or hurt
   “You’re very vulnerable right now.”
9. drift
   be in motion due to some air or water current
   And a curtain drifted in on the wind and caught the hot plate, and the trailer burned down quick.”
10. flee
    run away quickly
    So I fled my house and went to school.
11. suspicious
    openly distrustful and unwilling to confide
    And I’d been so suspicious of them.
12. death camp
    a concentration camp where prisoners are likely to die
    But somehow or another, Indians have forgotten that reservations were meant to be death camps.
13. arrogance
    overbearing pride evidenced by a superior manner
    I was the only one with enough arrogance.
14. chronic
    habitual
    And the tribe of chronic masturbators.
15. drought
    a shortage of rainfall
    Drought hot.
16. vulture
    a large diurnal bird of prey feeding chiefly on carrion
    Vultures flying circles in the sky hot.
17. dormant
    inactive but capable of becoming active
    So the scientists said it was probably an ancient and dormant volcano crater.
18. plummet
    drop sharply
    I kept expecting one of them to snap and send me plummeting to my death.
19. cling
    hold on tightly or tenaciously
    We clung tightly to the tree as it swung in the breeze.
20. vantage
    place or situation affording some benefit
    From our vantage point, we could see for miles.
21. translucent
    allowing light to pass through diffusely
    I missed my white friends and white teachers and my translucent semi-girlfriend.
22. scintillating
    brilliantly clever
    We’d always been such scintillating conversationalists.
23. mock
    constituting a copy or imitation of something
    I said, mock-surprised.
24. graze
    the act of feeding as in a meadow or pasture
    “So I looked up nomadic in the dictionary, and it means people who move around, who keep moving, in search of food and water and grazing land.”
25. nomad
    a member of a people who have no permanent home
    “You’re an old-time nomad,” Rowdy said.