I. native american culture

I. NATIVE AMERICAN CULTURE:

James Merrell: “The Indians’ New World”in Major Problems in American History, ed. Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman and Jon Gjerde
Prologue Story:

Tisquantum, a member of the Patuxet nation, example of life that suggests the connection between NA and Euro invaders.

–1605 was kidnaped by English and carried off to England

–there he learned Eng. Lang

–returned in 1614 and was kidnaped again and taken to Spain

–his abductors wanted to sell him into slavery but was rescued by Catholic priests with whom he lived until 1618

–He returned to New England coast to discover his nation had been destroyed by disease some years earlier.

–Shortly after his return he met English Pilgrims and taught them how to survive in the wilds and was a participant at the first “Thanksgiving” and became their trading partner.

–Today we refer to him as “Squanto”

–1622 he was attacked by what English called “Indian fever” and died.

–His life illustrates the experiences of NA with Europeans:

–slavery

–war

A. Characteristics of NA culture before invasion

1. Not static

2. Complex civilizations developed and evolved

Eg. The Aztec empire–now what is Mexico was known for its military power.

Eg. Anasazi –in what is now Arizona and New Mexico

Hopewell –in present day Illinois

3. Hunted, gathered, grew agricultural products ie. Potatoes, squash, beans, maize.

4. Numbered in the million

5. America was NOT empty.

–Think of Early period as a clash of three cultures: Red/White/Black

–different world views, cultures, religion, and social practices

I. Spanish and French in North America

A. Spanish

1.1518–small pox introduced into new world

2. 1519–Hernan Cortes from Spain conquered Aztec empire and began to extract silver–

–between 1545-1660 they took over 7mil

–Aztecs soon found themselves slaves

1. 1534–Jacques Cartier first explored the St. Lawrence River -commissioned by French King to find a Northwest passage

2.–French rather than conquer the NA began trading with them especially furs which was a depleted commodity in Europe at the time.

3. –by 1600 over a thousand European ships were trading furs

4. 1562–French Huguenot colony planted along the mid-Atlantic coast

–French Protestants who came to New World in search of religious freedom

–Jean Ribault and 150 Protestants landed on Parris Island near present day Beaufort, SC.

–Ribault returned to France but was caught up on religious wars and the colonists nearly starved to death, resorted to cannibalism, and were eventually picked up by a British ship

5. –1564 Ribault established another colony, Fort Caroline in present day Jacksonville. Established friendly relations with NA, Timucuas.

1565–St. Augustine Spanish were sent to crush the Huguenots.

A. Chesapeake

1.1584-87 Sir Walter Raleigh’s colony on Roanoke Island which failed

–Raleigh was Queen Eliz I commander who invaded and crushed the Irish in the 1560s of Catholic influence and settled English Protestants along the coast of Ireland.

B. 1607–English found Jamestown

–James I gave royal charters for colonizing the mid-Atlantic

–Virg. Co. Came with ships to Chesapeake Baoy where 100 men built a fort and became the first permanent settlement.

–Home to 24,000 Algonquian people

–confronted by Powhatan

–Spanish had already tried to settle and brought disease and conflict to the region

–English saw themselves as “conquistadors” and refused to work and only survived through the help of Powhatan.

–When Powhatan realized the English ultimate intent he sought to starve them out.

–Winter of 1609-1910 500 colonists were reduced by spring to 60.

–Virg. Co. Sent large additional force of men, supplies, and livestock and committed to a protracted war with NA.

–1613 English captured Powhatan’s favorite daughter, Pocahontas. Worn down and wanting to see his child Powhatan signed a treaty with Eng. in 1614. She in turn married John Rolfe, but died after being sick in 1617 on a trip to England.

–VA ultimately survived because of tobacco trade which had become the rage in England by 1620. John Rolf had developed a hybrid that was well received. However, as it was cultivated quickly it depleted the soil pushing whites further into Indian territory.

–1619-24 –English families were being thrown off their land and came to VA for work. 4.500 came between these five year.

–English were not interested in trading with the NA, emphasis on settling families who farmed thus pushing the NA to the periphery.

1609– Spanish found Santa Fe
III. English in Mass.

A. The Social and Political Values of Puritanism

----influenced by John Calvin --Protestant reformer

--unique teaching regarding God's sovereignty or controll over creation

--Human beings were marked by total depravity gaining salvation only through grace.

--gained popularity in England among a group of Anglican dissenters who felt the Anglican church of Elizabeth I had not gone far enough in getting rid of Catholic ways. They were soon named the "puritans" because they wanted to "purify" the Church of its Catholic vestiges.

--English Puritans motive for colonizing was based in their theology and search for a New England. They believed God had worked in the establishing covenants with gorups of people, covenants that promised blessings for people who lived faithfully to God. They believed God had established such a covenant with England and therefore dispared over their country's failure to obey God. Fearing God's wrath they sough to move to a place where they could build a Christian commonwealth--- or a model of "Christian Charity" for the whole world to see---a "city on a Hill."
B. Early Contacts in New England

1. Dutch Traders

–Samuel de Champlain established trading with Algonquians as far south as Cape Cod.

–established a trading post in Hartford

–John Smith explored northern coastline. His plan to live in New England were aborted when he was captured by the French

–1616-18 epidemic ravaged the native peoples of Northern Atlantic coast. Whole villages disappeared and trading between French /Dutch ended. Nine tenths of Indians died.

–native population went from 120,000 to less than 70,000. Thus so crippled they could not resist the English.

C. . Plymouth Colony and the Mayflower Compact

--1620- Pilgrim emigration

–Separatists–moved to Holland in 1609 but could not tolerate their children being seduced by Dutch culture/society.

–backed by the Virginia co. they immigrated to NA with William Bradford and 102 people aboard the Mayflower.

–arrived in Mass. Bay at the Indian village of Patuxet–the English called it Plymouth.

–dissent among the single hired men and the Pilgrims led to the drafting of the Mayflower compact–the first document of self government in North America.

–nearly half died during the first winter. Unlike the Roanoke or Jamestown settlers they were rescued by the Indians.

–Massasoit the sachem leader of the Pokanokets also known as the Wampanoags offered food and advice in return for an alliance against the Narragansetts.

–this was familiar pattern of the Indians trying to incorporate the settlers into their world.

–the interpreter in the negotiations was the Indian, Squanto, who had learned to speak English when he was captured by the Captain of an English ship in 1614.

–secured seed corn and taught them how to sow and cultivate corn.

–Plymouth was never successful–subsistent farming and fishing, however they did after two or three years become a self sustaining community.

–by mid century the population dispersed into eleven separate communities.

D. The Massachusetts Bay Colony

1.---1629–Puritans come to Mass. Bay

2. Royal charter was given to wealthy Puritans who called the enterprise the Mass. Bay Co.

3. 200 settles left for the fishing settlement of Maumkeag on Mass. Bay. which they renamed Salem.

4. John Winthrop was their leader.

–called New England “a city on a hill” a model of reform for all the world.

–Great Migration: 20,000 came between 1629-43.

–founded Boston in 1630

–1640 spread to Conn.

5. Transferred governance to the colony in 1629 due to a loophole in the charter.

–General court composed of governor, board of magistrates and members of the corporation known as freemen.

–Winthrop declared all male heads of households and church members as freemen.

–Two years later freemen could select delegates to represent the towns in drafting law of the colony.
—delegates /magistrates were separated into two legislative houses.

–The joint stock company provided the roots of democratic suffrage and a bicameral division of legislative authority.

A. Economic differences were rooted in each other's cosmology

1. Characteristics of English economy left behind in England:

--Inflation--on the supply side with importation of vast quanitites of silver/gold

--population growth outstripped available resources.

--Landowners were being squeezed by rising costs and fixed incomes

--tenant farmers could not find land so became low-skilled workers/day laborers.

--skilled workers were squeezed by fixed wages and increasing costs--underemployement was epidemic

--Joint stock company became a bright spot for England and encouraged foreign trade.
2. Puritans and economy

--talked about covenant/contracts

--churches were civil societies/covenented communities.

--at the same time they expressed anxiety about the economic changes because they saw disorder wherever they looked in the Elizabethan era.

--freedom from traditional hierarchial relationsihps were feared/welcomed.

--Puritan remedy:

--strengthened self discipline

--watch and discipline or strong regulation of moral and economic affairs in their communities.

--eg. League of Iroquois and Powhatan Conferderacy

--mixed economy which included hunting/fishing and gathering with Ag.

--network of trade

--obsidian from Rocky Mts, copper from Great Lakes, shells from Long Island. Further south NA relied on AG.

--Agriculture within NA communities meant more permanent homes/villages.

--Sexual division of labor: women farmed /men hunted.

--value of work and property differed from English

--Preferred leigsure to work--worked for only that which they needed

--gathering the surplus was easier than clearing and cultivating.

--avoided labor intensive techniques--when soil became exhausted they moved on.

--property ownership was cooperative aming the community/kin group or village.

--the land was not owned but the right to use it.

C. . NA religious belief and Economy

--Animist--activity in nature directed by spiritual power

--successful living requried cooperation and assistance of the spiritual power that anaimated nature.

--speical rituals; unneccessary killing; hunting and farming are sacred

--English saw religious obligation to labor to turn nature into commodies that were better sold than consume.

--nature was to be transformed/acted upon by human exertion

-- nature was converted into private property that could bought and sold

--nature a spiritual power with which they must reckon.

--property rights conditional

--saw spiritual potency of European goods

V. How NA came to experienced the European invasion -- in three stages:

1. Bacteria broght the most distruction and change to NA cultures

2. Major epidenmic: 1698,1718,1738, 1759.

3. Swamps were deathtraps for Europeans.

4. 1701 John Lawson visited Carolina upcountry where 10,000 NA lived and estimated that this represented one sixth of those that had lived there 50yrs. earlier.

--whole towns were destroyed by smallpox.

--1759 --60% of the natives were wiped out because of small pox.

5. This type of catastrophe resulted in impoverishment of a righ cultural heritage. 6. Prevent the population from independence. leading to migrations from ancient territories and mergers with nearby peoples.

7. The disruptions were like anything previous.

eg. the dislocations of Saponi Indians

-1670 they lived on the Staunton River in VA. A decade later they moved to the coaset and built a town near the Occaneechees. In 1701 when John Lawson came upon them they were on the verge of banding together in a single village with Tutelos and Keyauwees. In 1714 they applied the VA Lt. Gov. Alesander Spotswood to move further up the Meherrin River. By 1720 they moved to the Catawba Nation. But that arrangement did not last and many returned to VA in 1732.

--while these up country NA did not sail away to some unknown coutnry they nevertheless were uprooted.

--Lawson referred to them as "wandering, shifting peoples" but was unaware of the disruption that accured when they lost their sacred territory, graves of ancestors, knowledge

of the land for food/hunting/gathering that had to be left behind.

--abandoned customary relationships when they were forced to merge with other tribes which meant revising rules and reweaving of the social fabric.
B.. Traders

1. Slower to arrive than small pox

2. The absorption of European goods into established modes of existence hid th erevolutionary consequences for some time.

3. Liquour had profound affects--extraordinarily destructive.

4. Indians failed to learn the manufacturing aspect of the goods they sought meant they became caught up on the production of raw goods for foreign markets. This was a move away from the local self-sustaining economy that they had been used to.

5. By looking beyond their own territories, Indians were intoduced to two variables in the exchange equation: Slaves and deerskins.

--led to inter-tribal competition and conflict over hunting territories.

--in turn NA lost control over their own destiny.

--traders abused Indians in thier trading ngeotiations realizing they had a sellers market. Indians appealed to government for help with no avail. They rebelled in 1715 for example when the Catawba tried to invade S. Carolina. Goods were cut off to the interior. Realizing they couldn't live without the help of the English, Catawbas sought a peace agreement and Catawba headmen readily realized they no longer held control over their own people, they had become embedded into the alien economy.
C. Settlers.

1. Settling in Carolina upcountry began in 1730 and spread with frightening spead.

2. By 1754--500 families lived within 30miles of the Catawbas

3. Settlers had little use for the NA

--they made poor servants

--they obstructed settlement

--they attracted warriors

--Catawba fondness for liquor made them problematic

--conts. cross cultural problems

--Catawbas complained that settlers distrupted burial grounds, rule of hospitality.

---settlers were erasing the native signature on the land and enscribing their own in the name of improvements: bridges, roads, fences, and buildings.

--Notions of Independence on both sides caused unresolved conflict.

4. 1760s Catawbas began to trade with their neighbors leading to a process of accommodation . The achieved the legal right to their land --a reservation from which they could rent and produce goods to trade.

Eg. Of Cultural Exchange and encounter: The Life of Pocahontas

–At the time she was a young woman of 13 or maybe even 12 and the daughter of the chief of the Powatans.

–She was subsequently kidnaped by the English, converted to Christianity, and married to John Rolfe, an English planter, with whom she had a son, Thomas.

–She traveled to England and attended the court.

–1617--Upon her return to VA she died and was buried at Gravesend, England.
–Her story comes to us through various published accounts by men:

Smith’s writings:

1. 1608–A True Relation

2. 1612–A Map of Virginia

3. – Proceedings of the English colonie in Va.

4. 1624–The Generall Hisotrie of VA
Ralph Hamor writes of her kidnaping and marriage in Discourse of the Present Estate of Va (1615,1617)
Smith’s longer account of Pocahontas after her death and after the massacre of 350 colonists in Jamestown in 1622 by the Powhatans begins to present her as one of charitable benevolence, an image affirmed in Ben Jonson’s public theater play, The Staple of News in 1726.
–Its been argued that the construction of the idealized Indian woman emerged at the time of when the slaughter of Indians was justified because of the Indian massacre.
Karen Robertson argues in “Pocahontas at the Masque” in Signs Spring 1996.
—This idealization of the Indian woman was the genre used in the Disney’s Pocahontas. They chose to remove the Rolf part of Pocahontas’s life story. They further employed a “romance narrative” with an exclusive focus on the rescue of Smith while allowing for a “progressive message urging racial tolerance thus avoiding those events more challenging both to romance and to contemporary American racism: her marriage to a different Englishman, and the birth of an interracial child.” (556)
Disney found uses for the Pocahontas story as did many after her death and even during her life.
How was the Indian woman perceived in literature:
1. She was a “tabula rasa” waiting inscription by the bearers of the true word:

–a savage yet nubile nymph who longed for the English embrace”

–“Through her marriage and conversion, Pocahontas became the living emblem of the virtues of English colonization in VA.”
2. A projection of the men who write about her:

–confronted with radical difference embodied in the NA woman

–men try to control that difference by silencing her–we never hear her own voice

–or by transforming her into a form recognizable and acceptable to the English monarch.

–this reveals their assumptions about gender
3. Assimilated other–one of the first Powhatans subjected to educational procedures of the colonists and the process of colonization that was proceeding in VA.

–demonstrated in the way she was pictured the and the type of dress she wears.