Quote:
Originally Posted by issybird
I wish! 
This won't be a revelation to anyone here, but still I'm struck that in the last year, fully one-fourth of our selections have dealt with the suppression of native peoples by white oppressors. There's a somewhat different perspective each time, that of: the dispassionate historian ( Conquest of the Incas), the colonized ( Things Fall Apart), the white usurper/exterminator ( The Secret River), and the exterminated ( Fools Crow). All of them, though, convey the essential message of the wrongness and evil at play.
Belle's link to the historical marker at the site of the Marias Massacre, with its aware and sensitive description of events, is another example of how our thinking has evolved. Or has it?
I'm going way O/T here in terms of the book, but I thought some might interested. Belle's link for me evoked the massacre marker in my own town, in an area that was first settled by whites nearly 400 years ago. See the first thumbnail* below.
It's factual, but perhaps a tad one-sided? Couldn't the eventual victors have recognized the various forces at play when it comes to historic markers? So for a fuller understading, let's move on to the post office, where we have a series of murals relating to the history of the town. There's the advances in civilized forces: the first church, the first school, the first building at the university. There are pictures related to economic progress: the falls at the mill pond, the unique flat-bottomed sailboats that allowed trade among the settlements as far as the tide reached, the first train. And the second thumbnail.*
Among other offenses, you'll note that despite snow on the ground, the Native American is wearing only a loincloth. The picture dates back only to 1959 and, for the non-Americans, the post office is a federal building. I'll add that the local tribe, the Abenaki, is not federally recognized. In fairness, I don't think the two are related and the lack of federal recognition relates only to the tiny number of Abenaki left and the difficulty in establishing geneology.
*I'm not much of a photographer; my apologies. |
Great post Issybirdy! When I finished reading it I immediately thought of a quote (unknown first source) that I recalled reading in which Native Americans commented on whites use of the terms battle or massacre:
‘When the whites win, it’s a “battle,” when the Indians win, it’s a “massacre.”‘
Coincidentally in search for that quote this is the top link that came up and in a way illustrates that point.
Revising the “Fort Dearborn Massacre”
Of course it has always been the victors that get to write the history, something that has not completely disappeared yet. Nor has the desire to renege on treaty terms even when those treaties were largely forced on unwilling tribes. Locally the Oneida people as part of being forced to relocate from New York were granted special hunting and fishing rights. I can't tell you how many complaints I've heard from the local general population over the years about those rights now being respected. Coincidentally the Oneida were loyal allies to the Americans during the War for Independence. Did them no good once the wars were over and the whites wanted them out of the way.
That mural of the (supposed) Abenaki is humorous. Not only is he dressed totally unrealistically for winter, but his dress is more influenced by what has come to symbolize an Indian (a Plains tribe) due to American portrayals in books, films, etc. than a historical Abenaki. And what's he doing skulking around that house with a torch?