James Axtell > Quotes

“They missed the chance to learn that “savage” and “civilized” are relative terms without objective authority or content, that “men call that barbarism” which simply is “not common to them”. Such a lesson was badly needed in that fiercely intolerant age, as it still is in our own more subtly and intolerant one.”
― James Axtell, The Invasion Within: The Contest of Cultures in Colonial North America

“It is simply not enough to know that English politicians and armies won the battle for eastern America—we already knew that. What we need to take into account, now that history is more than past politics, is that in cultural attraction and educational sophistication the English were decidedly inferior to their French and Indian rivals, who lost what they did for other reasons.”
― James Axtell, The Invasion Within: The Contest of Cultures in Colonial North America

“Most of the words we use in history and everyday speech are like mental depth charges. As they descend [through our consciousness] and detonate, their resonant power is unleashed, showering our understanding with fragments of accumulated meaning and association.”
― James Axtell

“It is simply not enough to know that English politicians and armies won the battle for eastern America—we already knew that. What we need to take into account, now that history is more than past politics, is that in cultural attraction and educational sophistication the English were decidedly inferior to the their French and Indian rivals, who lost what they did for other reasons.”
― James Axtell, Invasion Within

“The blind faith that they were God’s “chosen people” prevented them from recognizing the tragic hubris in their national compulsion to “reduce” the natives to less than they were. Born of pride, the European philosophy of conversion spawned the triple terrors of cultural arrogance, dogmatism, and intolerance on a grand scale.”
― James Axtell, The Invasion Within: The Contest of Cultures in Colonial North America