English 4371: Cultural Encounters

Householder, fall 2005

11/8/05: From Virginia to New England

 

 

 

  1. An interpretive problem: Smith’s account of his reunion with Pocahontas.

 

    1. What happened? 

 

 

 

    1. What does it mean? 

 

 

 

 

    1. Silent debate: one way of refining a question or problem (and therefore a thesis). 

 

 

Reflects Pocahontas’ motives

Reflects Smith’s motives

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

    1. Selecting and explaining evidence

 

 

    1. Pocahontas as a fantasy of native submission. 

 

 

 

  1. The Jamestown Massacre of 1622: Backgrounds and Context

 

 

    1. Peace of Pocahontas. 

 

 

    1. George Thorpe and the dream of conversion. 

 

 

 

    1. Opechancanough/Mangopeesomon. 

 

 

 

    1. March 22, 1622. 

 

 

 

 

  1. Edward Waterhouse, A Declaration of the State of the Colony in Virginia. 

 

 

 

    1. Virginia in an imperial context: setting the record straight (1-3)

 

 

 

    1. “the Countrey is not so good, as the Natives are bad, whose barbarous Savagenesse needs more cultivation then the gournd it selfe, being more overspread with incivilitie and treachery, then that with Bryers” (11). 

 

 

    1. The massacre itself: what are some of the themes that Waterhouse develops? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4.      Consequences. 

 

 

a.      Justified extirpation as colonial policy. 

 

 

                                                              i.      an alternate view by John Donne

 

 

b.     Turned attention to New England

 

 

5.      John Smith’s Description of New England (1616). 

 

 

 

a.      “who would live at home idly” 

 

 

 

b.      Profit vs. “private covetousness” 

 

 

 

c.      The American dream

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Conclusion: 

 

 

Next time:  The founding of the colony at Plymouth.  Read Mourt’s Relation pp. 1-38.