White's Belief Of The Indians Belief example essay topic

Today, certain themes are shared by both cultures: "New World version of the theme of descent, ascent, and salvation is the way by which the tropical hell of jungle and jungle Indians is so clearly opposed to the terrestrial paradise of the highlands above. The imagery proper to each realm, as well as the cycle of death and rebirth connecting them, reappear persistently down through the ages-as we shall see in curing visions of poor white colonists, Indians, and Capuchin missionaries in the twentieth century in the Putumayo" (Lery, 292). Another common aftereffect of colonization is the creation of myths that combine the deities, and people of the two cultures involved. This idea is not new; it occurred even in Ancient times when one Greek city-state would conquer another. Stories would be constructed that found a way to link together particular concepts of both the conqueror and the conquered into a form that both could identify with. Tying Christian mythology to Indian mythology and therefore changing the course of remembered history symbolizes an attempt of both cultures to integrate or assimilate certain aspects of one culture into the other.

"This seems tantamount to saying that the historical function of the Virgin is the political one of accommodating the pagan to the conqueror's god and thereby, in this case, establishing the divine legitimacy of white rule" (Lery, 196). It is also ironic that in most of the myths it is the Indian who discovers the catholic saint. "It is the Indian who is chosen by history to provide the civilized and conquering race with a miraculous icon. As a slave attends the needs of the master, so the conquered redeem their conquerors" (Lery, 189). What made the Indians "wild savages" was not what they were in reality but how people believed they were.

"It is not the Indians' belief that is here at issue, but the white's belief of the Indians' belief" (Lery, 197). This image that was created by the colonizer was often used to justify the spread of imperialism and domination, as well as used to further underlying (economic / political ) causes. "In thus using them [Indians], the company objectified its fantasies concerning the people of the forest, creating very real savages from its mythology of savagery in order to coerce the people of the forest into gathering rubber" (Lery, 391). The rubber boom is one demonstration of this technique and all of the atrocities that resulted from it.

It is important to note that the Indians were not the only ones to synthesize new customs into their culture. At times whites would rely on Indian shamans for such things as healing illness, curing their farm, or helping them figure out a problem. How people's concepts of "Indian" affected their perceptions is illustrated by the following: "As with their manual labor, skills, and land, this power of the primitive can be appropriated, in this case by grafting it onto the mythology of conquest so that illness can be healed, the future divined, farms exorcised, wealth gained, wealth maintained, and, above all, envious neighbors held at bay. But unlike land and labor, this power did not lie in the hands of the Indians or the blacks. Instead it was projected onto them and into their being, nowhere more so than in the image of the shaman. In attempting to appropriate this power, we see how the colonists reified their mythology of the pagan savage, became subject to its' power, and in so doing sought salvation from the civilization that tormented them as much as the primitive onto whom they projected their anti-selves" (Lery, 168).

With colonization comes the creation of the colonial consciousness (Schwartz, 202-212). This consists of two main parts, one psychological, the other more economically based. First, is that the natives begin to associate themselves with the colonizer's concepts of being "native" and these often take on a negative form of meaning. This is due to the fact that it is hard for one group to dominate another unless it is under the belief or impression that it is superior in some way to the group that it is dominating. "It was more reassuring to deny the humanity of the natives and decry the barbarism of their customs, and then seek to uplift them. One could rationalize exploitation with a sense of moral responsibility" (Schwartz, 412).

If stereotypes exist long enough they become accepted and believed by many as social facts. Secondly, with economic development and the introduction of a world market changes occur within the society. These changes often create capitalism and class systems. It is generally the "elites" of native society, the ones who went to the missionary schools, or who assimilated the most with the colonizers that go on to achieve in this system. They eventually become the upper class and set up a neocolonial form of rule in which they imitate the values and life styles of the former colonists.