The Fatal Environment: White Supremacy and Myth

Warning: Undefined variable $num in /home/shroutdo/public_html/courses/wp-content/plugins/single-categories/single_categories.php on line 126

Warning: Undefined variable $posts_num in /home/shroutdo/public_html/courses/wp-content/plugins/single-categories/single_categories.php on line 127

Myth and history are not mutually exclusive. Richard Slotkin provides his own definition of myth in The Fatal Environment: The Myth of the Frontier in the Age of Industrialization, 1800-1890. “Myths are stories, drawn from history, that have acquired through usage over many generations a symbolizing function that is central to the cultural functioning of the society that produces them,” writes Slotkin. (16) His work rests on the foundation that myth is an essential part of history, shaping, influencing, and molding a culture’s perception of its own history and past. Slotkin’s main thesis revolves around the idea that the glorified myth of the frontier on the eve of the industrial age was in fact a warped vision of the true history of the frontier.

I almost found Slotkin’s argument, though believable, to be repetitive. He argues that the history of the frontier was not a completely romanticized dream, but a story about white supremacy and racial superiority. The doctrine adopted to white man’s treatment of the West revolved around converting savages and suppressing their otherness. Frontier ideology, epitomized by James Fenimore Cooper, “centered on the representation of the history of American development as the confrontation between warring races, Indian and white.” (100) Slotkin then goes on to explain, “In the triumph of the white and the vanishing of the red, the progress of civilization is achieved, in both moral and material terms.” (100) White Americans viewed the conquering of the Indian in the West as an ultimate conquer over nature, for Americans regarded the Indians as an integral part of nature and the wilderness itself. I agree with Ian that “in breaking down Slotkin’s definition, we can see his position in that humanity does in fact exist in nature, as human heroics are allowed to tread there.” In class, we often discuss the possibility that mankind and their workings are as much a part of nature as any other animal. Looking through a twenty-first century lens, I could find support in Slotkin’s work that man is in fact a part of nature and the wilderness. Looking through a nineteenth century looking-glass, however, it might have been hard to consider Native American Indians as “mankind” when they were so often looked upon as savages.

Slotkin’s discussion on the conquering of nature reminds me of different aspects of human nature. Men are afraid of defeat, afraid of destruction. When white Americans sought a controlled nature and suppression of the Indian race, it was due to their fear of the “Custer Complex.”  This complex was based off of the drive to conquer men and nature at any cost. Americans feared a defeat similar to the defeat of General George Custer by the Sioux. They also used Custer’s defeat as justification to rid of the Indian population to “protect or avenge the imperiled female.” (377) Slotkin argues that Custer’s defeat became a prominent legend of American West mythology. (14) Not only did the loss become a part of American myth and legend, but also placed itself within a conversation of gender and racial discrimination. Slotkin’s literary and historical approach in his work present interesting arguments in a somewhat unusual way, but his thesis does not extensively add to a new historical argument about white supremacy and oppression.