Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in What You Pawn I Will Redeem, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Native American Culture and Identity
Money, Capitalism, and Morality
Racism and Colonialism
Death and Grief
Summary
Analysis
With the $20 from the pawnbroker, and the $5 from their panhandling, Jackson, Rose of Sharon, and Junior head over to the 7-Eleven and buy three “bottles of imagination.” They drink all of it in an alley while they brainstorm different ways to come up with the money for the regalia.
Jackson is caught up in a vicious cycle of earning and spending. As soon as he earns money he spends it on alcohol, which is his main way of coping with the hardships he faces every day as an American Indian.
Themes
