Savagery In Colonial America

John Smith, from book 3, chapter 2 of his book, The Generall Historie of Virginia, New-England, and the Summer Isles, wrote about his adventures in the new land of the Indians where he experienced new people, a new governance system and a new culture (Smith, The Generall Historie of Virginia, New England & the Summer Isles 43). Smith, who was an English soldier, explorer and author, ventured into a new and unfamiliar territory where he experienced many unknown and unusual conditions and his writings depict his initial experience with the natives of this new and hostile land. He referred to the indigenous people as “savages” based on their hostile nature and brutal behavior towards him and his men. Initially the native chief, Powhatan, wanted to torture and Kill Captain Smith but he

The Irish and Native Americans had similarities and one of them was the awful ways in which they were treated. The English colonizers believed that Irish people were lazy and unable to improve the lands they lived on, which is why they prohibited them from purchasing land (Takaki, 29). Native Americans were similarly not allowed to own lands because the English colonizers believed they didn’t work hard enough (Takaki, 40). Both of these groups were denied lands because of a belief that they were incapable of working. However, the Irish and Native Americans were capable of working, but this was used an excuse for English colonizers to take over as much land as they could. Furthermore, another way they were treated equivalently was in the ways that English colonizers wanted both of these groups to assimilate.

Europeans lived a much more modern way of life than the primitive lifestyle of Native Americans. Europeans referred to themselves as “civilized” and regarded Native Americans as “savage,” “heathen,” or “barbarian.” Their interaction provoked by multiple differences led to misunderstanding and sometimes conflict. These two cultures, having been isolated from one another, exhibited an extensive variation in their ideals. Europeans and Native Americans maintained contradictory social, economic, and spiritual practices.

The frequent depiction of the “Noble Savage” trope has many functions, with its main function being to portray Native Americans as sinless uneducated humans and to make their abusers and torturers seem evil and superior, which in most cases the torturers are indeed evil. Bartolomé de Las Casas and Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca use the “Native Savage” trope for different reasons, which makes their portrayal different, and not because they are writing about different tribes and groups of Native Americans. The “Noble Savage” is a very common adaptation of Native Americans, but the definition isn’t as pretty as the name of the trope may seem to be.

were looked at as savages to the Anglo- Americans because opportunity and fortune were at

William Bradford even referred to them as “these savage barbarians” and intimated that the natives were “wild men” just like the “wild beasts” that occupied the “hideous & desolate wilderness” to which he gave the Lord credit for redeeming them from their oppressors the natives

Then, upon hearing stories of native groups cannibalizing their enemies, early European explorers perpetuated this belief. As a result, the Europeans were given the justification of bringing “civilization” to the “noble savage”. This belief of European superiority was used to excuse despicable acts

During American colonial times, the native peoples of the new world clashed often with the English settlers who encroached upon their lifestyle. Many horror stories and clichés arose about the natives from the settlers. As one might read in Mary Rowlandson’s Narrative, often these disputes would turn to violence. To maintain the process of the extermination of the natives alongside Christian moral beliefs, one of the main tenets of colonial life was the belief that the natives were “savages”; that they were morally and mentally inferior to the English that settled there. As is the case with many societies, certain voices of dissent began to spin. These voices questioned the assertions

In the “Remarks Concerning the Savages of North America” Benjamin Franklin writes about the Native American people and their way of life. In Benjamin Franklin’s essay he shows that the Native American people are far from savages. He explains how they are indeed civilized people. He says “perhaps, if we examine the manners of different nations with the impartiality, we should find no people so rude, as not to have some remains of rudeness.” The reason the Native Americans were called “savages” was because their rules of common civility, religion, laws and culture were different from the American culture and being that we were just socializing we did not understand their way of life.

The process of colonization in the Americas was a complex and complicated series of events, each driven by the varied interests of an array of European empires. For some, the Americas were a world of untold riches, while for others, this discovery allowed for missionary efforts to convert Native Americans to their faith. Regardless of the reason, violence against the many Native Americans who inhabited this “new land” was a common colonization tool to achieve these means. Direct violence is the most well-known approach, one that Spain wielded so effectively that the Black Legend was created to attest to their cruelty. Yet, the violence used was not all direct in nature. Cultural violence, which England employed itself, was used just as often. Overall, though the Black Legend has led to Spain being viewed as the most violent colonizer in the Americas, England’s use of indirect violence through engagement in the fur trade and missionary efforts was just as destructive to Native Americans.

In the 1700s British rule had conquered Ireland and took over, forcing the Irish to leave because of English tyranny. When the Irish finally came to America, they were compared to Blacks, in the fact that they were “imagined as apelike and a “race of savages”, at the same level of intelligence as blacks”(Takaki 149). And to escape the same category as Blacks, the Irish had to attack and belittle them. This was because the Irish came to America for survival and to find jobs, they did not want to be in a subordinate class and feel undervalued, many worked on railroads, canals and the women were maids who earned more than some men. Themes in this chapter include discrimination and oppression.

In his article, Morris bring attention back to the old meaning of the word savage, of when it was used as a derogatory towards others from around the world, or in our own home towns. He tells of a young boy, Sherman Alexie, who loved the old John Wayne movies, an Indian boy, who when watching John Wayne fighting the ‘savage’ Indians to save his niece. Morris quotes Alexie when he said “I rooted for John Wayne even though I knew he was going to kill his niece because she had been ‘soiled’ by the Indians…. I hated those savage Indians just as much as John Wayne did” to illustrate how the word ‘savage’ pushed the image of Indians as dangerous, uncivilized people. For years, media has used the word savage to illustrate a gruesome view towards those they are writing or talking about.

What is a savage? The first definition that may come into some people’s mind is a ferocious, uncivilized being. This is precisely what the people outside of the Reservation think of them. The savages live within the Reservation, but their life isn’t perfect. They may have the ability to think and are taught to live without the pleasure factor of soma, but they live surrounded by an electric fence.

In Benjamin Franklin’s 1784 comical satire Remarks Concerning the Savages of North America, the reader is made to question who the real savage is. Franklin offers us a window to the point of view of the Native American Indian, and how they might perceive the colonists. What is interesting is that according to the natives, Franklin says, the colonists and their way of life and what they consider as important in life is really quite ignoble to them; “Our laborious manner of life, compared with theirs, they esteem slavish and base; and the learning, on which we value ourselves, they regard as frivolous and useless” (Franklin 244). In fact, further along in Franklin’s writing we are told of the occasion in 1744 where the native’s feelings regarding

Native Americans are not savages aren’t savages, modern Native Americans have evolved and been influenced by American culture to be more, ”Human”, this is reflected in the novel Reservation Blues when Thomas builds-the-fire meets Robert Johnson and the kids and parents are anxious to ask questions, that’s proof that they have been influenced by American culture because the people asking the questions which belong to the Spokane Reservation are not following the Rules of Conduct that is a part of the