Fatal attraction: the white obsession with Indianness. From: The Historian | Date: June 22, 2003| Author: Dyar, Jennifer | COPYRIGHT 2003 Phi Alpha Theta, History Honor Society, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan.  All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group.Copyright information

THE "dark, glancing, fearless eye, alike terrible and calm; the bold outline of his high, haughty features, pure in their native red": the whites of James Fenimore Cooper's The Last of the Mohicans stand mesmerized as they gaze at the young Indian warrior, feeling that they simultaneously observe both % being partially benighted in the vale of ignorance" and a "precious relic of the Grecian chisel." (1) As Cooper's novel suggests, white Americans have long been captivated by the lu...