Who really acted savagely? Norviel

1. The author's main point in this piece is to help us better understand the differences between the ways of different cultures. The differences in the way each group viewed and utilized the land, and the different ways they treated one another. Takaki is trying to convince the reader that the English believed that they were more superior than any other group of people, not only people with a different skin color like the Indians, but also people of the same skin color with different views and beliefs than their own such as the Italians.

2. The English were very closed minded, they did not care to hear how the Indians wanted to share the land or how to go about using the land in a profitable way that would not destroy it. They pushed the Indians out of their own land and destroyed their homes, showing their greed and hunger for control. The new land of the America's was built on the foundation of hatred and death. When John Smith arrived the Indians were kind enough to try and help him and his men survive since they were unprepared in how to survive themselves. Smith did not return their kindness and generosity in the end by "tricking" them into giving up more and more of their land to the English to use. The English men were too concerned in ownership rather than sharing, thinking that sharing land and food was nonsense. When many of the Indians died from diseases that the English brought over to their land, the English thought that even God believed them to be superior by killing the Indians off to make more room for them. Their conceitedness is shown when they established the social structure not allowing the Irishmen to wear clothes like theirs or own weapons like theirs. They did not allow the Irish to own land or have any say in their government.

3. Would the world be different today if the English would have been happy sharing the land with the Indians rather than feeling the need to control all of it? Would we still be as advanced as we are now? What if the Indians would have had the upper hand and decided to fight back against the English?

4. I did not care for this reading, I felt that it skipped around from one story to the next, talking about Irish then Indians etc. I also found it confusing being set in a play, but the way it was written I don't understand why they had to talk about this topic in mention of the play. It had good points and I liked the fact that it explained the truth as to how the English acted towards the Indians, the side that we normally never hear of. It is sad to think about how destructive the English were as well as how many innocent lives were lost in the establishing of our country.