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Ann Marie Plane Colonial Intimacies Indian Marriage in Early New England
The author discusses the interactions between Indians and the English Colonists in Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island, Plymouth, Connecticut, Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard in the late 17th and the beginning of the 18th century. She focuses primarily on the vastly different understandings of conjugal union. For the Indians in the pre-colonial world the most important and enduring links between adult men and women were those of clan affiliation and kinship, whereas the English regarded marriage as the most important factor. In their view marriage and hence household and family mirrored the larger society in miniature. They feared that Native practices such as premarital sex, polygyny and easy divorce imposed a threat to destabilize the orderly communities central to the Puritan agenda.
I assume that Plane wants to reveal how intimate relationships not only reflected the influence of European colonialism in southeastern New England but actually shaped the progress of colonial dominance, helping to make and remake the regions cultures (pp. 111). De facto divisions between the marriages of Indians and the colonists "tended to heighten cultural barriers separating whites from others, laying the groundwork for racial rather than cultural meanings of Indianness" (p. 151). Since Indians appeared lacking family governance and household ideology which were closely linked to marriage for the English minds, they were seen as inferior, unassimilable people who should be subordinated.
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This book is made up of many stories of interactions between Native Indians and European colonists. Plane uses an unusual set of Nantucket court records to show the impact of new marriage laws on the daily lives of Indian men and women. Unfortunately no written records from the Indian courts survived.
Furthermore travel narratives, missionary writings, diarists' musings, sermons and early histories complement the legal records that make up the backbone of her studies. Ann Marie Plane demonstrates a great skill in her elucidation of specific court cases. By doing so, she shows us the real tensions that existed within families, and between families and communities, in the different populations of early New England.
Scholarly reaction
Melanie Perreault criticizes that written records made by the English form the basis for her primary research. She states that "these cannot be seen as objective sources on an Indian perspective".
The review written by Nancy Shoemaker for the "Journal of American History" emphasizes that "marriage is used as a metaphor to naturalize political relationships, with New England cast as the husband taking Indian America for a wife". She zings that "Indians appear in the book more peripherally and dimly than the book's subtitle would suggest".
Finally, the review in the "American Historical Review" stresses that Plane only focuses on Massachusetts, thus omitting Rhode Island and Connecticut.
I enjoyed reading the book because it highlights so many stories of interactions between Native people and the Europeans. Thereby it seems to be lively and gives a good insight into the intimate lives of people at that time.
Bibliography
- The American Historical Review
http//www.historycooperative.org/journals/ahr/106.5/br_47.html, Vol. 106, No. 5, December 001; 0.10.0
- The Journal of American History
http//www.historycooperative.org/journals/jah/88./br_11.html, Vol. 88, No. , December 001; 0.10.0
- The William and Mary Quarterly
http//www.historycooperative.org/journals/wm/5.1/br_5.html, Vol. 5, No. 1, January 00; 0.10.0
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