Dene Oxendene Character Analysis in There There

Dene Oxendene is a storyteller at heart, a man on a mission to collect the stories of Native Americans living in Oakland in order to continue on the project his uncle Lucas died before finishing. Early on in the novel, Dene successfully secures an arts grant which will allow him to pay the participants of his project, incentivizing participation within the Native community. Dene, an amateur graffiti artist in his youth, has tagged the name “Lens” throughout Oakland—Dene does indeed see himself as a kind of lens meant to spotlight the stories of others. He joins the Big Oakland Powwow committee and sets up a storytelling booth there so that he can gather as many stories as possible. Dene never puts his own story on film, demonstrating his belief that the best, most worthy work is lifting up the stories of other marginalized individuals in hopes of making those who hear their stories feel less alone, if even for a little while. Quiet, introspective, curious, and affable, Dene takes his duty as a storyteller seriously while at the same time feeling immense personal gratitude and satisfaction at the chance to hear so many unique, painful, and strange tales of growing up and living as an Urban Indian in Oakland.

Dene Oxendene Quotes in There There

The There There quotes below are all either spoken by Dene Oxendene or refer to Dene Oxendene. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:

Cultural Identity vs. Personal Identity Theme Icon

“There is no there there,” [Rob] says in a kind of whisper, with this goofy openmouthed smile Dene wants to punch. Dene wants to tell him he’d looked up the quote in its original context, in her Everybody’s Autobiography, and found that she was talking about how the place where she’d grown up in Oakland had changed so much, that so much development had happened there, that the there of her childhood, the there there, was gone… […] Dene wants to tell him it’s what happened to Native people, he wants to explain that they’re not the same, that Dene is Native, born and raised in Oakland, from Oakland. Rob probably didn’t look any further into the quote because he’d gotten what he wanted from it.

Related Characters: ,

Page Number and Citation: 38-39

Explanation and Analysis:

[Norma] was crying. Dene […] thought about what it might have meant to her, losing her brother. How wrong it’d been that he’d left, like it was his loss alone. Norma crouched down and put her face in her hands. The camera was still running. He lifted it, pistol-gripped, pointed it at her, and looked away.

Related Characters: , ,

Page Number and Citation: 38-39

Explanation and Analysis:

Dene starts to say something about storytelling, some real heady shit, so Calvin tunes out. He doesn’t know what he’s gonna say when it comes around to him. He’d been put in charge of finding younger vendors, to support young Native artists and entrepreneurs. But he hadn’t done shit.

Related Characters: ,

Page Number and Citation: 146

Explanation and Analysis:

He crawls out through the black curtains. For a second the brightness of the day blinds him. He rubs his eyes and sees across from him something that doesn’t make any sense for more than one reason. Calvin Johnson, from the powwow committee, is firing a white gun at a guy on the ground, and two other guys are shooting on his left and right. One of them is in regalia. Dene gets on his stomach. He should have stayed under his collapsed booth.

Related Characters: ,

Page Number and Citation: 270

Explanation and Analysis:

Dene Oxendene Character Timeline in There There

The timeline below shows where the character Dene Oxendene appears in There There. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.

Dene Oxendene walks up an out-of-order escalator at Oakland’s Fruitvale Station and sees a train starting... (full context)

Interconnectedness, Coincidence, and Chance Theme Icon

Dene is on his way to face a “looming panel of judges” who will determine whether... (full context)

When Dene was younger and just starting to tag the word “Lens” throughout the Oakland public transit... (full context)

Lucas told Dene that he had come to Oakland to work on a new project—a series of on-camera... (full context)

Back in the present, Dene has been stuck underground between stations for ten minutes. He begins to sweat heavily, nervous... (full context)

As a youth, Dene tagged the word “lens” everywhere he could, but writing the graffiti made him feel lonely,... (full context)

In the present, Dene gets off the train in downtown Oakland and navigates his way through the busy streets,... (full context)

Dene enters the building where his interview is to take place. He mops his sweat using... (full context)

Dene is called into the interview room, where he sits in front of the panel of... (full context)

As Dene nervously waits for the judges to respond to his pitch and ask questions about his... (full context)

In the past, Dene came home from school one afternoon to an empty house. He found his uncle’s camera... (full context)

...participating in a project—and is being paid $200 to talk to a Native filmmaker named Dene about any story from his life he wants to tell. When Orvil sits down in... (full context)

...The man looks, to Calvin, like he’s white. Blue introduces the second new guy as Dene Oxendene, who is going to set up a storytelling booth at the powwow. Dene begins... (full context)

Dene is set up in Blue’s office with his camera and mic, interviewing Calvin for his... (full context)

...Native people he knows who hardly know anything about their own heritage, and then asks Dene when he’s going to start recording. Dene admits that he already is. There is a... (full context)

At the powwow, Dene is in the makeshift storytelling booth he’s set up on the field, recording his own... (full context)

Dene hears the first gunshots from inside his booth. A bullet whizzes through the curtains, and... (full context)

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Dene Oxendene Character Analysis

Dene Oxendene Quotes in There There

Dene Oxendene Character Timeline in There There

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