Defining History

A detailed Summary of Defining History


In the document, "Indians: Textualism, Morality, and The Problem of History," Jane Tompkins examines the conflicts between the English settlers and the American Indians. After examining several primary sources, Tompkins found that different history books have different perspectives. It wasn't that the history books took different angles that was troubling, but the viewpoints contradicted one another. People who experience the same event told it through their reality. This becomes a problem when a person who didn't experience the effect wants to know what happened. Tompkins said, "The problem id that if all accounts of events are determined through and through by the observer's frame of reference, that one will never know, in any given case what really happened (202)."

The problem was evident when Tompkins was researching the history of the Europeans and Indians. She started her inquiry with the book


The paradoxes keep on with the issues of how captured European children were treated by the Indians, James Axtell believed the children were taken and made more comfortable with nature, enhancing their lives. To the contrary, White into Red by Norman Heard addresses the treatment of captured children as cruel, claming many times the babies and toddlers were murdered (209). The inconsistency of views continue until Tompkins says, "It may well seem to you at this point that, given the tremedous variation amoung the historical accounts, I had no choice but to end in relativism. (213)"

"the early settlers lied to the Indians, stole form them, murdered them, scalped them, captured them, tortured them, raped them, soled the into slavery, confiscated their land, destroyed their crops, burned their homes, scattered their possessions, gave them alcohol, undermined their systems of belief, and infected them with diseases t

Some common words found in the essay are:
American Indians, Alden Vuaghan, Jennings European, Europeans Indian's, Norman Heard, Charles Hudson, Perry Miller, Game European, James Axtell, Jane Tompkins, animals fur, fur trade, tompkins examines, european settlers, tompkins found, animals fur trade, history books, miller didn't,

Approximate Word count = 621
Approximate Pages = 2 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: History

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