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"Their filthy trash": taste, eating, and work in Mary Rowlandson's captivity narrative

"Their filthy trash": taste, eating, and work in Mary Rowlandson's captivity narrative
"Their filthy trash": taste, eating, and work in Mary Rowlandson's captivity narrative
After colonist Mary Rowlandson was captured by Native Americans during King Philip's War, food and labor came to represent her fraught position between Native American and colonial worlds. Rowlandson learned to eat previously disgusting foods, but she also tried to convince readers that she preferred non-Native commodities. If she described her tastes as an odd mix between Indian and English, however, she depicted her eating as Indian. Rowlandson's approach to labor proved similarly motley. Her manufacture of English-style clothing identified her definitively as an Englishwoman, and her inconsistent approach to work meant that she frequently went without food. Rowlandson's unwillingness to work illuminates different English and Indian attitudes regarding gender. Throughout the war, colonists and Natives toiled to maintain food supplies and targeted foodstuffs as a military strategy. People used food to communicate with each other in ways that ultimately solidified the gap between Native and non-Native in colonial America
1547-6715
45-70
Herrmann, Rachel B.
35826b61-2831-438a-8896-f077ec48d56f
Herrmann, Rachel B.
35826b61-2831-438a-8896-f077ec48d56f

Herrmann, Rachel B. (2015) "Their filthy trash": taste, eating, and work in Mary Rowlandson's captivity narrative. Labor: Studies in Working-Class History of the Americas, 12 (1-2), 45-70. (doi:10.1215/15476715-2837496).

Record type: Article

Abstract

After colonist Mary Rowlandson was captured by Native Americans during King Philip's War, food and labor came to represent her fraught position between Native American and colonial worlds. Rowlandson learned to eat previously disgusting foods, but she also tried to convince readers that she preferred non-Native commodities. If she described her tastes as an odd mix between Indian and English, however, she depicted her eating as Indian. Rowlandson's approach to labor proved similarly motley. Her manufacture of English-style clothing identified her definitively as an Englishwoman, and her inconsistent approach to work meant that she frequently went without food. Rowlandson's unwillingness to work illuminates different English and Indian attitudes regarding gender. Throughout the war, colonists and Natives toiled to maintain food supplies and targeted foodstuffs as a military strategy. People used food to communicate with each other in ways that ultimately solidified the gap between Native and non-Native in colonial America

Text
Herrmann, Their Filthy Trash pre-proof version.pdf - Accepted Manuscript
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More information

e-pub ahead of print date: 23 March 2015
Published date: March 2015
Organisations: History

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 375460
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/375460
ISSN: 1547-6715
PURE UUID: 8b5b3c8b-59a9-4ff4-9cd0-b5144d13f6a3

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Date deposited: 27 Mar 2015 11:37
Last modified: 14 Mar 2024 19:26

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Author: Rachel B. Herrmann

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