Reading National Anxieties in the Construction of the Native American Body as a Colonial Text in Catherine Sedgwick’s Hope Leslie

To sway public opinion, Catherine Sedgwick structures the Native American body as a colonized site she uses to justify Indian removal for the sake of national expansion and to assuage public anxiety regarding removal policies. Sedgwick links the body to textual discourse with the suggestion that Magawisca’s face contains a readable text that discloses her personal history. In fact, Magawisca’s body contains the discourse between the Puritans and the Native Americans, making her and her race the political object for Sedgwick’s nationalistic purpose. The analysis of Hope Leslie argues that while the early American novel attempts to justify the violence associated with removal or assimilation policies, they also document the wrongdoings against Native Americans, which, ironically, develops the nation’s postcolonial conscience, creating anxieties about the past that play out in our current political arena.