White Americans’ Dehumanization Toward American Indians in John Steinbeck’s The Pearl Hening Wulandari Kadarsih 1 , Ferdinal 2 , Zurmailis 3 {heningwulandarikadarsih@gmail.com 1 , ferdinal09@gmail.com 2 , lilik_sastra@yahoo.co.id 3 } Faculty of Humanities, Universitas Andalas, West Sumatera, Indonesia Abstract. The article explores the representation of the issue of white American’s dehumanization towards American Indians in John Steinbeck’s The Pearl. The article describes the fact that Steinbeck addresses dehumanize approaches which white Americans did towards some aspects of American Indians lives including the lifestyle, belief, and culture. In the analysis, we use the sociological approach by applying the concept of dehumanization by Frantz Fanon. The research shows that Steinbeck concerns mainly about three dehumanize acts by white Americans against American Indians. First, white Americans conditioned the American Indians to obey the rules and adjust their lives. Second, American Indians had to embrace white American’s religion. Third, white Americans forced American Indians to pursue their culture especially the language and art. Generally, this study shows that Steinbeck disagrees with discrimination and oppression by White Americans towards American Indians. Keywords: Dehumanization, Ethnic deterioration, American Indian, Colonialism. 1 Introduction Dehumanization is the psychological process of demonizing the enemy, making them seem less than human and hence not worthy of humane treatment. This can lead to increased violence, human righs violations, war crimes, and genocide. This is illustrated in the novel The Pearl . The Pearl is one of the famous literary work written by John Steinbeck in 1945, and The Pearl appeared for the first time in Women’s Home Companion Magazine in December 1945 as The Pearl of World. This novel had been adapted into a film. As a famous American author, Steinbeck had got The Nobel Prize in literature in 1962. The Pearl particularly depicts the attitude of White Americans toward American Indians in detail. It is known that White Americans treat American Indians as they like even inhuman. Steinbeck wants to show that the Whites did vicious matter toward American Indians. They oppress, rob and look down toward the Indians. The Whites do what they want to American Indians without considering them as humans. They do not care about their right either. They keep on terrorizing American Indians for their profit. The White Americans influence the Indians in many aspects. Indians had been the victim of the White Americans since the Whites came to America for the reason of the land, resources, or even laborers. Consequently, the Indians lost their land gradually destroyed and the White Americans confined them begot for the part of the reservation. To make it worst, the White Americans caught and forced them to work as laborers or even as slaves as Steinfeld said that one of the IConShel 2018, September 05-06, Padang, Indonesia Copyright © 2019 EAI DOI 10.4108/eai.5-9-2018.2281034