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Queequeg´s Coffin: Indigenous Literacies and Early American Literature
Birgit Brander Rasmussen
€ 30.99
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Description for Queequeg´s Coffin: Indigenous Literacies and Early American Literature
Paperback. Rather than seeing American literature as beginning with the writings of English or Spanish colonists, Brander Rasmussen points to the wide variety of indigenous writing in the Americas prior to colonization. The study looks at writing between 1524 and the mid-19th century work of Herman Melville. Num Pages: 224 pages, 1 map, 10 figures. BIC Classification: 1KBB; DSBB; JFSL9. Category: (P) Professional & Vocational. Dimension: 5969 x 3963 x 13. Weight in Grams: 340.
The encounter between European and native peoples in the Americas is often portrayed as a conflict between literate civilization and illiterate savagery. That perception ignores the many indigenous forms of writing that were not alphabet-based, such as Mayan pictoglyphs, Iroquois wampum, Ojibwe birch-bark scrolls, and Incan quipus. Queequeg's Coffin offers a new definition of writing that comprehends the dazzling diversity of literature in the Americas before and after European arrivals. This groundbreaking study recovers previously overlooked moments of textual reciprocity in the colonial sphere, from a 1645 French-Haudenosaunee Peace Council to Herman Melville's youthful encounters with Polynesian hieroglyphics.
The encounter between European and native peoples in the Americas is often portrayed as a conflict between literate civilization and illiterate savagery. That perception ignores the many indigenous forms of writing that were not alphabet-based, such as Mayan pictoglyphs, Iroquois wampum, Ojibwe birch-bark scrolls, and Incan quipus. Queequeg's Coffin offers a new definition of writing that comprehends the dazzling diversity of literature in the Americas before and after European arrivals. This groundbreaking study recovers previously overlooked moments of textual reciprocity in the colonial sphere, from a 1645 French-Haudenosaunee Peace Council to Herman Melville's youthful encounters with Polynesian hieroglyphics.
By recovering the ... Read more
Show LessProduct Details
Format
Paperback
Publication date
2012
Publisher
Duke University Press United States
Number of pages
224
Condition
New
Number of Pages
224
Place of Publication
North Carolina, United States
ISBN
9780822349549
SKU
V9780822349549
Shipping Time
Usually ships in 7 to 11 working days
Ref
99-1
About Birgit Brander Rasmussen
Birgit Brander Rasmussen is Assistant Professor of American Studies and Ethnicity, Race & Migration at Yale University. She is coeditor of The Making and Unmaking of Whiteness, also published by Duke University Press.
Reviews for Queequeg´s Coffin: Indigenous Literacies and Early American Literature
"Quequeeg's Coffin sweeps away the origin stories of American literature by beginning with the encounter between European colonialism and indigenous cultures; it revises prevailing notions of 'literacy' and 'writing' by placing indigenous literary traditions alongside, and in dynamic relation to, the alphabetic systems of the colonizers; and it emphasizes the often volatile interactions between, and continuing syncretism among, vastly different ... Read more