Kris Maulden's Questions - Week 3
The following are my discussion questions for the Axtell book. Students who wish to post questions or responses should use the comments button below; please read the student questions as well because they will steer discussions as much as my questions.
1. How do Europeans demonstrate their own biases in their accounts of the Indians? More specifically, how do they show that they are products of a patriarchal society and how do they react when they encounter Indian cultures with different ideals?
2. Imagine that you are a missionary and you have read this book before coming to the New World. Which aspects of Native American cultures would you want to "fix" and which do you think would be helpful in making Indians more like Europeans? Do you see any aspects of Native American cultures with which you could compromise? Overall, what kind of strategy would you have in mind when you arrived at your first Indian village?
NOTE TO STUDENTS POSTING QUESTIONS: If the question you have in mind has already been posed, try to elaborate on the original question or ask a different one entirely. Do not simply repeat previously asked questions.
1. How do Europeans demonstrate their own biases in their accounts of the Indians? More specifically, how do they show that they are products of a patriarchal society and how do they react when they encounter Indian cultures with different ideals?
2. Imagine that you are a missionary and you have read this book before coming to the New World. Which aspects of Native American cultures would you want to "fix" and which do you think would be helpful in making Indians more like Europeans? Do you see any aspects of Native American cultures with which you could compromise? Overall, what kind of strategy would you have in mind when you arrived at your first Indian village?
NOTE TO STUDENTS POSTING QUESTIONS: If the question you have in mind has already been posed, try to elaborate on the original question or ask a different one entirely. Do not simply repeat previously asked questions.
posted by Anonymous at 2:26 PM
4 Comments:
In Refrence to Axtell's The White Indians of Colonial America
Question: Do similarities exist between: How the English tried to "convert" the Indians to civilized Englishmen citing "the English were confident that the Indians would want to be converted once they were exposed to the superior quality of English life", and what the U.S. does abroad to promote democracy and the western way of life in other nations?
Responding to Nolan Wesche's post. Everyone wether it be a family, a city, a state, or a country believes that the way they do things is the correct way. No one can say who is right or wrong. Society can only chose what is best for themselves. Democracy may not work for everyone only time will tell. Societies that downgrade the role of women will be less prosperous in a Democracy because not everyone will be heard and protected. A peoples culture determines the best government for them. I am not advocating dictatorships or autocracies, however, the middle east will not be successful until certain cultural aspects are reformed
This is the same for Europeans in the New World. Europeans believed themselves to be superior wether they truly were or not is up for debate. The truth of the matter is people will always believe they are right regardless.
Permit me to chime in regarding Lane's question: It is tougher to get at the Indians' prejudices because they left so few literary sources before the 19th century. They definitely had them, however: to them, Europeans were dirty, impolite, greedy, and insufferably pompous. Native men tended to see European men as effeminate (womann-like or unmanly) for performing what the Indians' considered women's work like working in the fields.
I feel that although family structure would be much different, the social structure would be as well. The Indians weren't focused so much on "their" family as we are today, but more the community as a whole. They seem to have been much more concerned for the well-being of everyone, as opposed to society today which is more self-serving.
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