The Importance of the Role of Egdon Heath in Return of the Native

William Cronon’s Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England is all about the changing condition of the land, New England in the newly discovered world. It talks about the ecosystem, plants, and animal communities and how they were affected by the new settlers. As the inhabitant of the distant world were introduced to the New England drastic changes took place and both world eventually started to become same, as William states in his thesis “the shift from Indian to European dominance in New England entailed important changes—well known to historians—in the ways these peoples organized their lives, but it also involved fundamental reorganizations—less well known to historians—in the region’s plant and animal communities”

“Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging”, by Sebastian Junger, is an insightful examination of the flaws of a modernized society. Through scientific evidence and first-hand accounts, the book explores the correlation between a nation’s level of modernness and it’s rates of mental illness. Junger careful choice of words and phrasing shows that he is not arguing that a tribal society is better than a modern society- as “there’s no use arguing that modern society isn’t a kind of paradise” - but is instead proposing a blend of both society’s beneficial qualities (Junger 108). His chronological writing style within “Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging” allows for the development of his argument. Particularly focusing upon Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in veterans, Junger utilizes accounts from Vietnam War and World Wars to bring light to the “antihuman society” set forth by our modernized ways (Junger 93).

Later, the narrator has a problem falling asleep in his murky bedroom, because his memory of the priest’s “grey face” brings nightmares. The boy tries to think of something different, but “the grey face still followed him” (3). Being dark in the young boy’s room, the boy is scared. The room where the priest lies in his house is black, only lit by a few candles. The candles add gloominess to the room. At the very end of the story, the dark confessional booth is a sign of darkness where the boy can sit and think of past thoughts. The room shows no light. Faith portrays no light to be a dark image.

According to the Shaper, “Grendel was the dark side…in effect. The terrible race God cursed” (51). From his very upbringing, Grendel was cursed, set apart from the rest of nature. This isolation became evident throughout the novel as it seemed both humans and nature were against him. In the novel Grendel by John Gardner, the theme of nature fighting what is unnatural is supported by the motifs of animals, snakes, and trees.

Throughout history Native Americans have experienced hardships, Native Americans have been run over for resources and treated unfairly. Over the years Native Americans have always been considered to be at a disadvantage when dealing with the Europeans due to their lack of communication and education. The Native Americans need to be given back if not all some of the land that they owned.

Human rights are the rights of humans, regardless of nationality, gender, race, or religion. We should all have this in common as we are all part of humanity. However, Indigenous people did not always have these rights (Ag.gov.au, 2015). Aside from basic human rights, Indigenous people also have their own rights specific to their culture. Before 1967, Indigenous people had different rights in different states and the Australian federal government did not have any jurisdiction over Aboriginal affairs until Australia’s constitution was amended for this purpose in 1967 (Moadoph.gov.au, 2015). Between 1900 and the present time, there have been significant changes to the rights of Indigenous Australians. The effects of the European Settlement on the Indigenous people of Australia have been devastating. When white people began arriving in Australia, the Aboriginal people believed them to be ghosts of ancestor spirits. However, once they realised the settlers were invading their land, the Aborigines became, understandably, hostile (Slater & Parish, 1999, pp.8-11). In 1788, the total Indigenous population was believed to be between 750,000 and one million. By 1888, the Indigenous population was reduced to around 80,000 Australia wide (Korff, 2014). The three main reasons for this dramatic decline were the introduction of new diseases, violent conflicts with the colonisers, and settlers acquiring Indigenous land (Digital, 2015). In 1848, the Board of National Education stated that it

I am Tisquantum, or as you may know me, Squanto. I am the last of my tribe. I was taken from my homeland, the Americas as a slave to Spain. From Spain, I traveled to England, Newfoundland, and back again to my homeland, near Plymouth. I am now free, but use my land, animal, and English knowledge to assist the new settlers of Plymouth in a multitude of ways; I also use my influence with the natives and the Colonists for my own benefit. Unfortunately, I died an early death, but my legacy remains today, with the national holiday of Thanksgiving (Tindall & Shi, 2013).

The exploration and settlement of the Americas by the Europeans had devastating effects on the Native Americans. As Europeans began to explore the Americas and form settlements a great majority of them saw the Native Americans as savages and pagans that needed to be civilized. As exploration and settlements expanded the Native American population and culture was decimated by disease, war, loss of land, the exploitation internal feuding among the tribes and enslavement.

Evil is commonly portrayed in characters that are heartless and cold externally, but true evil sprouts from deep within one’s soul. John Gardner's Grendel is the tale of an outcast monster that struggles to find his place in the world. Throughout the course of the novel, Grendel is affected by the perceived evil inflicted upon him by others. One will find that Gardner’s depiction of the character Grendel provokes sympathy in the reader and proves that he is not evil, and therefore not punished for any evil actions; he is simply placed under the superficial title of evil because of the actions of his peers, which include the humans’ illustration of him as a mindless

My experience is a bit different compared to other minority group experiences because I am a Caucasian American with Hispanic from Central America. People from a minority of Native American, African American, Muslim American, Chinese/Japanese American, and Jewish American would all have a complete unalike experience compared to me. Central Americans and Vietnamese Americans I feel it is rare for these two cultures to come together and that is what makes my experience so unique to the situation. A similarity and the only similarity I could find between Central Americans and Vietnamese Americans is they both immigrated to the United States. Central America immigration has increased significantly and added to the diversity in the United States.

The Native Americans were a continuously evolving population. Every century their way of living enhanced. This resulted in sturdy, permanent housing after years and years of moving non-stop, clans turning into tribes, the birth of horticulture, better weapons for hunting, and traditional burial ceremonies. How could 90 percent of this large population vanish because of diseases carried by the European colonists and explorers?

The novel Frankenstein and The Fall of the House of Usher both have the pattern of the question of what constitutes the human. This question helps in the creation of aspects of horror and the unknown. In Frankenstein the question is created with the creation of the monster. In The Fall of the House of Usher the same question is created when Roderick acts depressed almost like he is being possessed. This question is a frightening proposition because the unknown and un-human is a deeply-rooted human fear. It is this fear that makes these stories frightening.

Brown also proves to be impressionable and easily influence because after one ambiguous night, he lets himself change into a completely different man. Before entering the forest Brown was close to his community. However, after one night of spending with the devil, he returns a cynical pessimistic man who only sees the evil in his community. They way he regarded those in his society changed overnight. The impression was so strong that it did not last a month or a year but a lifetime. Even at

" This could be his way of proving himself worthy in some way due to the fact that he say that neither his father nor his grandfather had completed his task at hand. The second idea is in the reasoning that Hawthorne had simply utilized it as the setting and forged the story around the forest and its characterized darkness and evil notions compared to that of the town which is light and absent of evil until Goodman Brown returns. This is a definite formalistic observation in the contrast of forest and the town. The forest is used as a setting which Hawthorne utilizes to expose the faults in all of mankind, including the self professed religious. No matter which way you believe, Hawthorne has successfully left the issue as a mystery and an undeclared element of the narrative.

Emily Bronte’s portrayal of Heathcliff presents him to readers “as dark almost as if it came from the devil’ and a ‘dirty, ragged, black-haired child.” (Emily Bronte) Although her suggestive description indicates Heathcliff is black, the author’s lack of a definitive depiction evokes ambiguity. Bronte purposefully intrigues readers with her absence of certainty by selecting specific language and creating a semantic field of the colour black. Bronte resurfaces the reader’s assumptions