Captivity And Conversion Narratives By Hilary E. Wyss

In Captivity and Conversion, Hilary E. Wyss challenges the traditional Indian-American models of captivity and conversion narratives, by which historical accounts represent Native Americans. She raises the question â€Å"What makes a story Native American?† Wyss argues that these narrative models are not an accurate universal representation of Native Americans. Essentially, Euro-Americans filtered Native American history, according to their bred expectations, to share Native American history through the ideal models of captivity and conversion narratives. Generally speaking, captivity narratives tell of the tragic events endured by Anglo-Saxon victims of Indian captivity; Conversion narratives are based on American Indians who abandon their subordinate culture for an Anglo-Saxon one. To prove the inefficacy of these binary models used to encompass all Native American individuals, Wyss uses the autobiography of William Apess and the accountings of Mary Jemison to exemplify nont raditional Native American stories of captivity and conversion. Moreover, the autobiography of William Apess contradicts the standard Native American conversion narrative. Although Son of a Forest tells the story of a Pequot Indian, who adopts the Anglo Saxon culture and religion, it is also a narrative that voices the experiences of being held captive as a Native American. William Apess’ autobiography does not fit the model prearranged to fulfill the classic story of an American Indian, because he expresses