Western Expectations

Objectification of Natives of the North

Image depicts a group of women posing for a photograph. Four of the females in the image appear to be dressed in traditional clothing while the fifth one, in the back left corner, appears to be dressed in western clothing. Prior to white contact women did not wear hats. Additionally the women dressed dominantly in western clothing seemed to distance herself from the rest of the group, supporting the idea of a staged photo meant to capture exotic nature of Native women.

The Jesuits went to Alaska to superimpose religious concepts of civilized behavior through a bigoted and biased lens, which did not reflect the acts of Christ, rather reflected a power-hungry organized religion. The Jesuits, like many other missionaries who came before them, pressured indigenous peoples into converting to their religious agenda by treating Native peoples as nothing more than a commodity. Many Jesuits considered Native people to be savages who needed to be converted into civilized Christians. They failed to acknowledge the rituals and customs already present in the Native communities simply because they were different from their own practices. Instead of taking the time to truly learn about the Native people’s way of life, Jesuits simply went into Native communities with the sole purpose of converting the Native people. Despite their claim to want to learn about Native people it is evident through the Jesuit journals that they were simply there to criticize everything the Native people did: the way they ate, walked, dressed, cleaned themselves and behaved. In the end the only thing that really seemed to matter to the Jesuits were how many people they were able to convert despite the emotional and physical damage done to the community. The images taken during this time merely capture a moment in time that was stages by Jesuits so they could be sent back to Europe as proof of their process.