"euroamerican" - 1 õppematerjal

American Literature

across the Missouri." Cooper himself had little or no personal contact with Native Americans, just like the vast majority of his contemporary readers, who, to borrow Randall C. Davis's words, "accepted without hesitation the distinction between 'savagism' and 'civilization' as an explanation for Native Americans' perceived inabilities to assimilate neatly into EuroAmerican society." Though widely viewed as a sympathizer, if not a staunch advocate, for Native Americans, "Cooper was ambivalent about the westering advance of the society to which he belonged." Perhaps that is the reason why he did not clearly reveal in The Leatherstocking Tales his stand on the cultural clashes between the whites and the natives, especially the removal of the native from their lands. He seems to be more concerned with the ways of acculturating the native into the white society