Does Tayo defeat witchery—or learn to live alongside it?

The term "witchery" encompasses the destructive forces of white American society: the supposed achievements of technology and modernity that, in truth, have exposed the Laguna people to drink, war, and general disorientation. This motif of witchery and degeneracy plays out in several ways (through the character of Emo, through Silko's evocations of dire poverty), but also appears in an allegorical poem that parallels the prose narrative. In this poem, a contest among witches results in the creation of a new race: "Caves across the ocean/in caves of dark hills/white skin people/like the belly of a fish/covered with hair" (125). This group of "white skin people" will overrun the landscape, sowing violence and snatching resources, much as white society at its apparent worst has taken land from Native American communities and sent American Indian young men off to war.

So yes, he defeats witchery through his healing. A half Mexican, half Native American young man who lives on the Laguna Pueblo Reservation, much of the narration of Ceremony, indeed, depicts Tayo's thoughts and memories. Thoughtful and sensitive, Tayo has been scarred by his experiences fighting the Japanese in the Second World War, and is especially haunted by the death of his cousin Rocky, which he witnessed. It is Tayo's hope to come to terms with these terrible recollections and restore himself to physical and psychological health. To do so, he re-connects with the nature-oriented traditions of his Native American ancestors and seeks solace in a lifestyle of self-reflection and purposeful work.