Link: https://archive.org/stream/conciseschoolhis02camp#page/n25/mode/2up
In this activity that we are doing in class, we are first looking up online the definition of the words "savage" and "savagery". According to dictionary.com, the definition of "savage" is to be fierce, ferocious, cruel, uncivilized, and barbarious. The definition of "savagery" is an uncivilized barbaric state or condition. Then we were to read pages 18-21 of an online history textbook passage from 1887 and look for how the author of the textbook described the native americans and the ways in which they lived there lives.
If I were an American student reading this text as part of schoolwork my view on Native Americans would be greatly affected. In this textbook the author most of the time does not even refer to native americans as native americans, just plainly as savages. If I knew the defintion of savage, which means cruel, uncivilized and barbaric, that is how I would see them. I would most likely not view them as people but as there own animal. When the author is describing the way they fight war, he is describing them as barbaric warriors who take no mercy. " The ones who could show the greatest number of scalps torn from his foes was considered the greatest warrior... Sometimes, when they took a prisoner, they would burn him at the stake by a slow fire, and torture him horribly in every way." The way the author is depecting the native americans, is exactly the definition of savage, cruel, barbaric, and uncivilized. My views about native american would have greatly deviated from before and after I read this text book. Ultimatley, I would think to myself "How are these barbaric things human beings?" based on the description given by the author. I would be terrified to ever see or meet one and I could not imagine living in the close proximity of a native american tribe.
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