Critique #1 "The Penguin History of Canada" by Robert Bothwell, 2006

Many of the histories are described from the viewpoint of the rulers. The writer says “along that frontier lived the Iroquois, who kept the colony in a constant state of fear.”(Bothwell, 2006, p.46) It seems natural for the Iroquois to attack the French people because they were deprived of their land, religion, and culture, and compelled to live only in the interior of the land. In old days they caught fish in the river and brought things freely on their canoe. But the European people came to their land and colonized there, which made the Iroquois unable to live along the river. It is not the Iroquois but the French people that kept the area in a constant state of fear, from the Natives' point of view.

The writer also says “Their mission was to… defeat the Iroquois. … As for the most hostile, the Mohawks, the French tried a march into their territory in January 1666. Luckily the expedition avoided disaster” (Bothwell, 2006, p.48-49) The word “mission” gives us the image that their job seemed solemn, which was to defeat the Iroquois and deprive the land from them, actually. And the word “hostile” gives us the image that the Iroquois were easy to get angry, primitive and inferior to the Europeans. We also feel it lucky for all the Iroquois not to be murdered, which was a kind of blessing or mercy given from the French army.

It is obvious that those historical descriptions help the discrimination to the minority people remain today. The historical description should be made from a variety of viewpoints