The English Embrace of the American Indians : Ideas of Humanity in Early America

This book makes a wide, conceptual challenge to the theory that the English of the colonial period thought of Native Americans as irrational and subhuman, dismissing any intimations to the contrary as ideology or propaganda. It makes a controversial intervention by demonstrating that the true tragedy of colonial relations was precisely the genuineness of benevolence, and not its cynical exploitation or subordination to other ends that was often the compelling force behind conflict and suffering. It was because the English genuinely believed that the Indians were their equals in body and mind that they fatally tried to embrace them. From an intellectual exploration of the abstract ideas of human rights in colonial America and the grounded realities of the politics that existed there to a narrative of how these ideas played out in relations between the two peoples in the early years of the colony, this book challenges and subverts current understanding of English colonial politics and religion. Annotation This text makes a wide, conceptual challenge to the theory that the English of the colonial period thought of Native Americans as irrational and subhuman, dismissing any intimations to the contrary as ideology or propaganda. It makes a controversial intervention by demonstrating that the true tragedy of colonial relations was precisely the genuineness of benevolence, and not its cynical exploitation or subordination to other ends that was often the compelling force behind conflict and suffering. It was because the English genuinely believed that the Indians were their equals in body and mind that they fatally tried to embrace them Front Matter....Pages i-ix Introduction....Pages 1-11 The Savage Mind: Metaphysics and the Humanity of the Indian....Pages 13-52 Savages in the Streams of Time: The Indian in English Historical Consciousness....Pages 53-89 A Digression on Air: Race and Climate in Early America....Pages 91-122 Powhatan’s Two Bodies: Civil Savage, Savage Colonist....Pages 123-157 Killing with Kindness: The Tragedy of Benevolence....Pages 159-198 Conclusion....Pages 199-208 Back Matter....Pages 209-237