INDIGENOUS PEOPLES
(Week 4)
LESSON OBJECTIVES – Upon completion of this lesson, students should be able to recognize the varying presentations of Indigenous peoples within Westerns, to evaluate inter-racial relationships within Western films and to connect presentations of race to their own experience within North America.
VIDEO CLIPS: Students can view the embedded video or press “CTRL” and left-click on the provided link to view on the host website. NOTE: The document may need to be viewed in “enable editing” mode to view the clips. Note: After viewing a clip, students may need to manually use the mouse to move the document via the right-hand scrolling bar or re-click their mouse within the document.
Optional Reading – Week 4: The Rough Guide to Westerns, pp. 208-210
INTRODUCTION
The portrayal of the Indigenous peoples of North America within Westerns was for decades that of obstacle to the expanding settler population of the West.
Racially-charged ideas of civilization would be used to justify a range of responses by the Euro-American settler society toward any perceived threat to “progress” – those responses ranged from negation of signed treaties to officially-sanctioned violence.
A framework emerged for racial stereotyping within North American public policy, cultural attitudes and eventually cinema.
The inclusion of Native American actors in films to play lead Native American parts took until the 1970s to reach regularity.
Westerns in the 1950s began to criticize the treatment of Indigenous peoples by the white settler society but lead roles in such films were still held by non-Native American actors, for example, Burt Lancaster in Apache (1954).
BURT LANCASTER in APACHE (1954)
http://www.wearysloth.com/Gallery/ActorsL/9777-796.jpg
It is important to consider the source of a Western film – the majority of the films have been made by non-Indigenous directors and producers.
The voice of an Indigenous-produced Western would be grounded in…