Religious Stereotypes In The Film, Black Robe

When Europeans encountered the Native Americans, the encounter was fraught with difficulties for both sides, for the Native Americans more so than the Europeans. Europeans conquered the Native Americans, forced them into labor, and spread diseases which the Native Americans had no resistance to. In addition to this the Europeans considered themselves superior to the Native Americans. Despite this, the Europeans and Native Americans, both had things the other wanted and so they often engaged in trade with each other. However, the Native Americans thought that, despite not having the luxuries the Europeans had, they were better off than the Europeans. This sentiment is exemplified in “Your People Live Only Upon Cod” by French priest Chrestian LeClerq who was traveling with the Micmac Indians. It is a documented response by an unknown Micmac leader to European, particularly French, claims of superiority. In analyzing this document, we will find that the cultures of the French and the Micmac were vastly different. We will also discover what the Micmac and the French thought of each other.

The film “The Mission” (1986) was written by Robert Bolt and directed by Roland Joffe. It explores the various relationships distinguished between Spanish Jesuits and Indian (Guarani) civilization situated along the borders of Paraguay, Argentina, and Brazil around 1750. Although, as stated in the beginning of the movie that “The Mission” is “based on true historical events”, Bolt and Joffe distort the portrayal of the Guarani and Jesuit relationships. This essay will examine the distortions of the Guarani tribe and the inaccurate “historical” events that took place within the movie.

In the opening scene of the movie the Frenchman Laforgue, whom repelled the Indian way of life, and the rest of the fathers deliver advanced tools, supplies, and weapons to the Algonquin Indians. Indians have the religious belief that those who can provide the best are the better leaders. The Frenchman used that to their advantage when providing the supplies. They used the supplies as a way to bribe the Indians to go on the journey with them and convert to Christianity. The supplies symbolized what they could have if they just accepted the Jesuits way of life and religious beliefs. On the voyage there was the Indian tribe, Laforgue accompanied by other Jesuits, as well a young non Jesuit male, Daniel. Daniel had no interest in going on the expedition to convert the Indians. Instead he was just bored and was looking for an adventure. Very early in the expedition Daniel caught interest in the

Black Robe presents the story of a French Jesuit missionary struggling to stay true to his religion while traveling from Champlain’s fur trading outpost to a Huron Native American mission in Nouvelle France during the 17th century. Father Paul La Forgue sets out on the 1,500 mile journey with members of the Algonquian tribe and a young Frenchman named Daniel Davost, determined to convert the “savages” to Christianity. Throughout the film, Father La Forgue faces the Algonquians’ beliefs that he is a demon, calling him “Black Robe”, and even abandoning him for a short period. Later, when his Algonquian guides and Daniel recover him, they are captured and tortured by an Iroquois tribe. Eventually,

Convinced of the superiority of Catholicism to all other religions, Spain insisted that the primary goal of colonization was to save the Indians from heathenism and prevent them from falling under the sway of Protestantism. The aim was neither to exterminate nor to remove the Indians, but to transform them into obedient Christian subjects of the crown. To the Spanish colonizers, the large native populations of the Americas were not only souls to be saved but also a labor force to be organized to extract gold and silver that would enrich their mother country. Las Casas’ writings and the abuses they exposed contributed to the spread of the Black Legend-the image of Spain as a uniquely brutal and exploitative colonizer. This would provide of a potent justification for other European powers to challenge Spain’s predominance in the New World.

Black Robe is a film that greatly exemplifies the views the Natives and the French held of one another during the 1600s. Both groups help impressions of each other that influenced how they interacted together. During the Native and French encounters in Black Robe, it was apparent that Natives viewed the French as incompetent, weak, but also interesting; the French had their own impressions that the Natives were savages and in need of salvation. It is with the Algonquins that one can see the interest they held in their view of the French. In Black Robe, there is a scene with the Natives sitting in a church-like building watching a clock.

The long history between Native American and Europeans are a strained and bloody one. For the time of Columbus’s subsequent visits to the new world, native culture has

Throughout the course of history there have been numerous accounts regarding Native American and European interaction. From first contact to Indian removal, the interaction was somewhat of a roller coaster ride, leading from times of peace to mini wars and rebellions staged by the Native American tribes. The first part of this essay will briefly discuss the pre-Columbian Indian civilizations in North America and provide simple awareness of their cultures, while the second part of this essay will explore all major Native American contact leading up to, and through, the American Revolution while emphasizing the impact of Spanish, French, and English explorers and colonies on Native American culture and vice versa. The third, and final, part of this essay will explore Native American interaction after the American Revolution with emphasis on westward expansion and the Jacksonian Era leading into Indian removal. Furthermore, this essay will attempt to provide insight into aspects of Native American/European interaction that are often ignored such as: gender relations between European men and Native American women, slavery and captivity of native peoples, trade between Native Americans and European colonists, and the effects of religion on Native American tribes.

The migration of European settlers and culture to North America is an often examined area. One aspect of this, however, is worthy of deeper analysis. The conquest of North America by Europeans and American settlers from the 16th to 19th centuries had a profound effect on the indigenous political landscape by defining a new relationship dynamic between natives and settlers, by upsetting existing native political, economic and military structures, and by establishing a paradigm where the indigenous peoples felt they had to resist the European and American incursions. The engaging and brilliant works of Andres Rensendez and Steve Inskeep, entitled respectively “A Land So Strange” and “Jacksonland”, provide excellent insights and aide to this analysis.

Throughout the stories told in both Mohawk Saint and The Unredeemed Captive, the unintended consequences of attempting to convert the American Indians to Christianity are powerful players in the unfolding events. When these Christian groups arrived in the New World, they came armed with the word of God that they wished to share among a group of people that have never before encountered the concept of Christianity. While eventually these relationships improved and Christians and American Indians began to have closer contact, there were still results from the conversion process that no one could have expected when the progress had started. In both of these stories, the unintended consequences of the encounters between Christian religious and

The Jesuits disagreed with the treatment of the sick as they prefered using their sugar, baptizing and “discrediting their sorcerers” methods of treatment for the sick attempting to disprove it. The shamans of the Huron responded to this by forbidding the use of “the french snow” as they viewed “that they should blame only the french” for their misfortunes(JR88,89) . This type of behaviours by the Jesuits openly insulting the Indigenous people’s culture leads to different reactions as to what actions should be taken in dealing with the French. Factions were created to decide whether to accommodate them, or to pursue open conflict causing certain factions to proceed with violence to achieve their political goal as is the case of the martyr

The Algonquin (Indians) and the French people are first shown in an area of Quebec in the 17th century. Both groups seem to be similar in that they both have a leader and dress similarly. However, looks can be deceiving as they have many cultural differences and various beliefs. These differences create misunderstandings, and lead the French to believe the Algonquin to be a group of savages. The Algonquin also believe the French to not be very intelligent. However, a mission to Huron territory changes both the Algonquin and French, and causes them to better understand each other, creating tolerance, and eventually cultural rapprochement.

On weekdays, besides daily prayers, catechism was taught to the children, and after supper a half hour’s reading from The Lives of the Saints, usually in the general’s cabin” (O’Brien, 247). The ship reached Quebec in June and Garnier led a procession to church. When an illness struck the village, the Jesuits took care of the ill even though medicine was not available during this time. They prepared broth for the sick ones and even tried to feed the ill raisins and prunes (O’Brien, 252). After taking care of the ill Hurons, Garnier and some of the Fathers contracted the illness. When the Indians heard that the Fathers were ill, they hurriedly went into the cabins to see how these men would drive out the evil spirits (O’Brien, 252). By mid-October,

Joseph Boyden’s novel The Orenda displays the tragedies of warfare, famine, disease, and the slow rise of colonization. The “Orenda” refers to the soul that inhabits all living things and the novel explores the loss of the Huron people’s Orenda as well as their way of living through the rise of Christianity. The colonization of the French people, in this case the priests, is what leads the Huron to lose their Orenda. This is caused by the Huron underestimating the power of Christophe Crow, letting more Europeans become a part of their society and the desperation that is caused by the great war against the Haudenosaunee. Overall, the tragedy brought upon to the Huron by the crows was too late to stop once they realized the situation they

I sometimes find myself asking if villains truly exist, and what they would look like if they did. Would they be petty nuisances, or a dark force slowly eating away at society? There are very few people that could fit this title, but in “Electric Funeral,” a chapter in I Wear the Black Hat: Grappling with Villains (Real and Imagined), Chuck Klosterman, a best selling author, details what some of these villains of today are: different types of technocrats. The three “villains” he mainly focuses on are Perez Hilton, Kim Dotcom, and Julian Assange, who each varies greatly on the spectrum of their acts. Hilton is a blogger who primarily focuses on celebrities and likes to post photoshopped pictures along with controversial