Journal #5

     So today I am writing about William Apess’ “And Indian’s Looking Glass for the White Man” and Lydia Sigourney’s “Indian Names”. William Apess was a mixed child with some white and some Native American in him! Although he did not grow up on Indian Territory (he was raised Christian and became a Methodist priest), he did want to know about his culture and heritage of his ancestors. Lydia Sigourney however was a prim and proper young lady from Connecticut; she was all about women’s education. She eventually opened a school for young girls. After reading both of these, one a poem and one a short story, I found that both had an underlying theme. This theme has to do with the injustice and the evils of racism. Apess’ story had to do with how the white man had become so prejudice against the Native Americans. He asked the white man if God had made a mistake in making the Native Americans or blacks, why did he make so many of them? In Sigourney’s poem, she talks about how the American’s have obliterated the Native American race. She discusses how there are still signs that life has been there but that it no longer exists. Sigourney states, “Ye say, their cone-like cabins, that clustered o’er the vale, have fled away like withered leaves before the autumn gale…” (17-19). This line really speaks to me because it shows that the Native Americans were there. People did see their teepees in the valleys and on the hills of their land. And now they have all seemed to disappear. She also wrote the poem in the past tense which is something that stand out to me.

In all, both of these writings discuss how the Native American society is being “tortured”. They have been wiped out of their homes, and have been people are prejudice towards them because of the color of their skin. Furthermore, these two pieces show how the Indian relocation and almost annihilation affected people.