2.6 Controversies and Dissent

e.g.

  • Thomas Morton “New English Canaan” 1630/1637: 1. major non-puritan account on NEw England → was imprisoned

  • Anne Huntchinson: made counter events to church, rejecting authority; Antinomian controversy of 1630s → court proceedings, was banned, seen as woman not fit for society

Salem Witchcraft Persecutions 1692

  • Puritan New England: irrational, cruel, repressive, reactionary society and culture

  • literary representation e.g. Arthur Miller “The Crucible” 1953

  • app. 200 people were accused (by other members of community (to get their land?))

  • alleged evidence:

    • bodily marks

    • confession

    • spectral evidence (testimony of other persons)

  • 19 hanged and one pressed to death

Indigenous-White encounters

- Wars (acting as archive of Indian depiction)

  • 1637,38 Pequot war

  • 1676,77 King Philip's war

  • 1689-97 King William's war

    → seen as God's punishment

- Missionizing

  • imperialist and oppressive phenomenon

  • Started bc they were critisized to not doing enough

  • Response in writing “Elliot tracts” (1647-1659) John Eliot → describes civilising devilish Indians

Repertoire of Native americans:

  • Stereotypes

  • Racisms

  • Nobel savages <→ wild monster (still both racist)

→ to establish / justify colonization of New England

Indigenous Counter voices

  • indigenous oratory

  • tribal histories

  • travel reports

  • protest literature/memorials

  • poetry

  • fiction

  • autobiographical writings

    • transcription of life story told to white person by indigenous persons

    • autobiographies written by indigenous persons e.g. William Apess

William Apess

e.g. “Indian Nullification of the Uncon-stitutional Laws of Massachusetts” 1835

His works:

  • challenge whites (are deceitful) and their perspective

  • praises traditional indigenous virtues (Indians as true christians)

  • protest against extinction of indigenous identities

  • rejects ethnocentrism and attacks racism