An analysis of the discourse in the Jesuit Relations indicates that the Jesuits' representation of Huron and Montagnais Indians is informed by a colonial ideology. The Jesuits' attempt to identify Indians according to permanent customs and manners is compared to conventional ethnographic description and is shown to result in a reductive, essentializing discourse. In their elaboration of the category of 'savagery' Jesuits metaphorically equated Indians with wild animals. They then stressed the need for reclaiming the Indians' humanity through conversion to Christianity. The Jesuits' figuration of the spiritual realm as a territory to be subdued and conquered is discussed, and the language of conversion is revealed as a language of control and conquest. It is finally argued that Jesuit representations of Indians functioned as an instrument of colonial domination. The analysis points to the need for decolonization of textual and historical spaces dominated by Eurocolonial discourses.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.60617 |
| Date | January 1991 |
| Creators | Blackburn, Carole |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Arts (Department of Anthropology.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001258321, proquestno: AAIMM72232, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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