English 6110: Seminar in American Literature I
Dr. Patrick Erben
Reading and Discussion Questions
Hans Staden, from The True History of his Captivity
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1) Captivity, Self-Fashioning, and Identity
a. Analyze the purpose of Staden’s account! What is he trying to accomplish? Who
is the audience?
b. How does he fashion himself? As victim, actor/hero, Christian saint/martyr,
native shaman, Renaissance man, etc.? What is the rhetorical economy of the
character/personality he fashions?
c. How do identity, textual creation, and experience intersect?
d. Does he is a German complicate his position before and during his captivity?
How? Or, does he in any way retool his liminal position (he’s neither Portuguese,
nor French, the two main rival colonial powers in the area)? How does this
complicate his negotiation of the captivity and his captors?
2) Cannibalism
a. Does Staden work as ethnographer (casting cannibalism as a cultural feature of
the native peoples)? How?
b. What does cannibalism mean to him? Is it a cultural tradition, a fatal flaw, a sign
of savagery, a measure of otherness, a form of psycho-terrorism?
c. How does Staden use cannibalism as a convenient narrative trick/trope to weave a
compelling story?
d. Gauge his textual/personal as well as public (what he says he reacted to the
Indians when witnessing cannibalism) responses. Would you have expected
something different? Why does he never mention what he is eating all this
time…?
e. What has the constant threat of being eaten to do with his own heroism?
f. Is the presence/mention of cannibalism at all funny/humorous? (also cf. to How
Tasty Was My Little Frenchman)?
3) Captivity, Colonialism, and the Contact/Clash of Cultures
a. According to Staden’s account, what has been the effect of European colonialism
on intra-Native American relations in Brazil, especially customs of captive taking
(and eating…)?
b. In how far are imperial rivalries tincturing native customs?
c. Compare the imperial rivalry between the French and Portuguese with the
animosity between the Tuppin Ikins and the Tuppin Imba. Do we have a clear-cut
difference between savagery and civilization?
d. How do the French and the Portuguese overall react to native customs, especially
cannibalism?
e. Does Staden acculturate during his captivity? In how far has he already
acculturated before he is taken captive? How do you interpret the captors’ crying,
and his crying in the very end?
f. How does Staden situate the “mameluke” people, results of the mixing of
European men and native women? What role do they play in his narrative?
4) Religion
a. Can you describe/characterize Staden’s faith/theology/religion from evidence in
the text?
b. How/when does he appeal to God, and what agency does he ascribe to God?
c. Is there any interiority/psychological questioning present? Any search for his
own ontological status (especially compared to Rowlandson)?
d. Evaluate his use of prayer and God’s supposed assistance on his behalf to gain
influence over the Indians!
e. Does he become more of a native shaman than he is willing to admit? Do you
also see anything sacrilegious in his use of prayer/religion (miracles?) to
manipulate his captors?
5) Language
a. How does Staden mostly communicate? Evaluate his use of the native language.
b. How does Staden communicate with the French?
c. Is there any language barrier and how is it negotiated?
d. Why do you think he uses quite a bit of the native language in his printed
account? What does it have to do with the rhetorical economy of the text?
6) Translingual/Transcultural Captivity Criticism
a. Compare Staden’s captivity to Rowlandson, Mather/Dustan, Swarton, and
Garcilaso de la Vega.
b. What cultural, linguistic (even in translation), rhetorical/literary, religious
differences do you find? What differences in subjectivity?
c. What are common themes?