How The Stereotypes In The Society Of The Spectacle

Carol Berkin is a professor at both Baruch College, and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, teaching American Colonial and Revolutionary History and also Women’s History. Berkin received her B.A. from Barnard College and her M.A. and Ph.D. from Columbia University. She is also the author of various books including First Generations: Women of Colonial America (1996), A Brilliant Solution: Inventing the American Constitution (2001), and Civil War Wives: The Life and Times of Angelina Grimke Weld, Varina Howell Davis, and Julia Dent Grant (2009).

Pocahontas and the Powhatan Dilemma is a novel written by Camilla Townsend, which illustrates a well detailed perspective of the life of Pocahontas, daughter of Chief Powhatan. It is often shown that Pocahontas 's story is misinterpreted, as many analyses of this subject are conducted by the speculations of various historical writings. To record, there is no single document by Pocahontas herself, so it is left for historians to rely on other people 's perspectives of the time. With the idea that most sources of this period would have come from rich, white men, these ideas would ultimately be biased in their views. In my opinion, I believe that the thesis regarding this book was to illustrate the true telling of Pocahontas and the effect of the English on the Natives residing in America during the 17th century. Specifically, I chose to analyze Chapter 3: First Contact, as Townsend was able to shed light upon the mythical idea of Pocahontas and demonstrate the plethora of inaccurate ideas portrayed by the settlers on the Native American culture.

This primary source, John Rolfe’s Letter to Thomas Dale about marrying Pocahontas, is from the settlement era and was written in 1614. The European settlers in this era, early 1700s, wanted land and to displace the natives not intermarrying with them. Most settlers remained separate from the Indian society. Some settlers married Native women as a way to gain access to the native societies. It was a way to gain an economic relationship. Indians were being forced off their land because they had no real claim of it. Settlers would establish their towns on sites previously cleared by the Indians. The marriage of John Rolfe and Pocahontas was a rare and unique circumstance in the 1700s. The letter to Thomas Dale is a window to a period of uncertainty between the white settlers and the Native Indians in North America. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the importance of this letter and its effects to the society in the time period after it was written. John Rolfe’s decision to marry Pocahontas proved to be vital at the time. John Rolfe’s letter to Thomas Dale for approval on marrying the Indian Princess Pocahontas reflects on how much society in the early 1610s depended on such thing as intermarriage between a white man and an Indian woman to help keep peace between the white settlers and Native Indians in North America.

1. Paula Gunn Allen (“The Patriarchalization of Native American Tribes” has explained that she chose to write about Native American tribes to restore the “lost perspective” of people whose stories were “erased”. But what does her historical work have to do with gender, and contemporary understandings of the “place” of women in society? • Allen’s concept was about how Western traditions changed the Native American culture. Native Americans, before Western traditions, had women as Chief’s of a tribe.

After studying women and gender history in early America for the past semester, my views about American history have changed tremendously. Having very little prior experience with history, I had many assumptions and preconceived notions from high school history classes. Women were never even mentioned in my previous learning about U.S. history, so I assumed they took on unimportant roles and had little, if any, impact on shaping our country’s history. However, after this semester of delving deeply into the women of early America, I could not have been more incorrect. Although they were not typically in the public realm, we cannot fully understand history without studying women. The following readings uncovered the roles of women in the private sphere and were crucial to my new understanding of the importance of women in American history by bringing women to the forefront.

Throughout the development and colonization of America, there were a lot of changes that affected Native American, Africans, and women. Within this paper, I will attempt to provide some insight and bring to light some of the changes and how they affected the folks involved. As the New World grew and colonized the rights of all were not equal or fair. Native Americans were focused on their homes to provide the New World. While Africans were kidnapped and focused into slave labor to provide economic growth for the New World. During this time women were always seen as a lower class citizen, not allowed any say in the way the colony was governed or grew. All of these minorities fought from the beginning of

We begin with Rowlandson’s, A Narrative in the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson, where her use of diction immediate grabs our attention regarding the stigma surrounding the Native Americans and that although they were men they were considered lessor beings that were without redemption. The young nation at large felt that Native American’s were lessor and it is shown through the use of diction in Rowlandson’s writings. In the following

Perdue’s topic is the gender construction and distinctions in 19th Century Cherokee Indian society, the traditional roles that women played and how cultural progression affected them specifically. Cherokee women lived in a world that was disrupted by trade and war which resulted in a shifting for

Today, the feminist movement is a worldwide force, calling for rights and equality for women. It’s come a long way from its shaky beginnings, especially for American women. Many know to thank the strong pioneers of feminism for bringing women so far- leaders like Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage. However, not many are aware of where they began, and how their ideas about the way women must be treated in a proper society were shaped. Though they are not often acknowledged, the women of the Iroquois confederacy had a major impact on the birth of American feminism (Oneida Indian Nation 2009).

Beyond the Indian Act, colonization had negative implications on gender relations within Indigenous societies. According to Weaver (2009), prior to colonization Indigenous societies were egalitarian and matrilineal. Women had leadership roles in the community and owned land, animals and property (Weaver, 2009). The colonization process disrupted traditional Indigenous gender roles in favour of a European patriarchal system (Weaver,

The land of the freedom for new settlers from England and Europe was for many seen as an opportunity to open new frontiers of prosperity, and land to own. The strong clash of culture, customs, religion and language was without a doubt a challenge not only for new settlers, but also for natives Americas in how to live from then on. English colonial women faced also this challenge when some of the women were abducted by Natives Americans and some of them decided to stay, due to the lack of rights, husband’s oppression, illiteracy, the inequality of jobs and gender roles.

Colonial America’s history from European settlement to the revolutionary war is a story that is best understood when told from multiple perspectives. It is a history that is not one of just the European immigrants, but also the African Americans and American Indians as well, with each ethnic group playing their own role in the development of the region. Although each group’s perspective may not be the same, their collective history is what makes Colonial America. Thus, through analyzing the various historical events and accounts of each of these groups, it can be determined that the history of Colonial America is one of liberty, opportunities, slavery and dispossession.

Examining the complex relationship between Indians and early English colonists, Karen Kupperman notes that English writers on colonization described Indian societies as viable civilizations and regarded economic prosperity in the New World as a viable option. Potential colonists saw the native peoples as potential trading partners and friendly and receptive to European settlements. This positive view, however, contrasted with other descriptions of savagery that grew out of cultural assumptions and misunderstandings about gender roles, matrilineal societies, clothing, diet, religious worship, and most critically, notions of individual property ownership and land use. The English and the Indians each viewed one another through their own frames of reference and understandings of how human societies should function. All of this contributed to the marginalization of Indians from English colonial society. In light of the conflicting nature of English-Indian relations, the decimation of the Indian population through disease, and the increasing difficulty and expense of indentured servants, the English eventually turned to African slaves for

When European settlers arrived, they had a pre-decided vision of what women ought to behave like based on the European women, which the indigenous women didn’t align with. Indigenous women were comprehended and characterized in ambiguous and conflicting terms. They could firstly be viewed as “noble savages” where they were seen as classic Indian Princesses, virginal, childlike, naturally pure, beautiful, helpful to European men, and open and willing to

In Jeannette Armstrong’s poem, History Lesson, she writes in perspective of Indigenous people reacting to the first encounters with European settlers. Historically, Indigenous people did not have a positive encounter with the first settlers due to their clash of beliefs and values of how communities and structures should run. Instead, they had many disagreements which caused the partial destruction of their whole culture. It is clear that Armstrong uses the theme of history to portray the destruction that the first European settlers had on the Indigenous way of life through various points in history. Armstrong imbeds the theme of history throughout her poem to further emphasize her stance on the assimilation of the Indigenous people with the restricting and destructive effects the early settlers had on them throughout history.