Native American Speakers of the Eastern Woodlands: Selected Speeches and Critical Analyses

by Barbara Alice Mann

Overview

This collection of essays examines, in context, eastern Native American speeches, which are translated and reprinted in their entirety. Anthologies of Native American orators typically focus on the rhetoric of western speakers but overlook the contributions of Eastern speakers. The roles women played, both as speakers themselves and as creators of the speeches delivered by the men, are also commonly overlooked. Finally, most anthologies mine only English-language sources, ignoring the fraught records of the earliest Spanish conquistadors and French adventurers. This study fills all these gaps and also challenges the conventional assumption that Native thought had little or no impact on liberal perspectives and critiques of Europe. Essays are arranged so that the speeches progress chronologically to reveal the evolving assessments and responses to the European presence in North America, from the mid-sixteenth century to the twentieth century.

Providing a discussion of the history, culture, and oratory of eastern Native Americans, this work will appeal to scholars of Native American history and of communications and rhetoric. Speeches represent the full range of the woodland east and are taken from primary sources.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780313312571
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	04/30/2001
Series:	Contributions to the Study of Mass Media and Communications , #60
Pages:	300
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.81(d)

About the Author

BARBARA ALICE MANN is affiliated with the University of Toledo. She co-edited the Encyclopedia of the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois Confederacy) (Greenwood, 2000), Encyclopedia of Native American Legal Tradition (Greenwood, 1998), authored Iroquoian Women: The Gantowisas and co-authored Euro-forming the Data.

Table of Contents

"Now the Friar is Dead": Sixteenth century Spanish Florida and The Gaule Revolt
"Are You Delusional?": Kandiaronk on Christianity
"By Observing the Methods Our Wise Forefathers Have Taken, You Will Acquire Fresh Strength and Power:" Closing Speech of Canassatego, July 4. 1744, Lancaster Treaty
"Then I Thought I Must Kill Too": Logan's Lament: A Mingo Perspective
"Woman Is the Mother of All": Nanye'hi and Kitteuha: War Women of the Cherokees
"I Hope You Will Not Destroy What I Have Saved": Hopocan before the British Tribunal in Detroit, 1781
"You Are a Cunning People without Sincerity": Sagoyawetha and the Trials of Community Representation
"I am Here and Stand before You Today, My Fathers, as a Man of Misery:" Chitto Harjoa and the Senate Select Committee on Oklahoma Statehood
"The Land Was To Remain Ours": The St. Anne Island Treaty of 1796 and Aboriginal Title and Rights in the 21st Century
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

Most of the Native American speeches studied are from the wars west of the Mississippi, and generally extol European conquest to one degree or another. Here scholars of literature present speeches by the eastern natives who greeted the French, Spanish, and later British invaders. They also analyze them and the contemporary European interpretation of them. Spanish Florida of the 16th century, the 1744 Lancaster Treaty, and war women of the Cherokees are among the topics. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews