Pequot War Analysis

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The article, The Pequot War, from the Mashantucket (Western) Pequot Tribal Nation is closer to Howard Zinn’s than Daniel Flynn’s interpretation of the Pequot War, because it is similarly one-sided, has a similar purpose, and neglects to discuss the role of other Native American Tribes in the conflict. However, while the article makes no attempt to acknowledge the Pequot’s involvement in the conflict, Zinn makes a feeble attempt to do so. The Pequot War and Howard Zinn’s Biased History both criticize another person or entity, yet the latter presents both sides of the story. Before we begin, the Pequot War, spanning from 1634 to 1638, is an armed conflict between the native Pequot tribe and an alliance of Puritans and a myriad of Native American Tribes (Zinn) (Flynn) (The Pequot War). I picked a short article from an organization dedicated to honoring the Pequot Tribal Nation’s history, The Pequot War. Given the website’s purpose, it comes as no surprise that they favor the Pequot Indians to the Puritans in the conflict. The Pequot Tribal Nation’s and Howard Zinn’s summary of the Pequot War are similarly tendentious and act to shed light on the underdog, whose voice is not often heard in dominant historical narratives. To this end, each …show more content…

The Pequot Tribal Nation criticize the Puritans by highlighting their brutality. One man remarks that the Puritans must "’destroy them by the Sword and save the Plunder’" (“The Pequot War”). Similarly, Flynn makes direct attacks on Zinn, stating that “This melodrama depends on simplistically dividing mankind into two groups – and only two: oppressors and oppressed. This is how Zinn describes and utterly distorts the early settlement of North America” (Flynn). He also calls A People’s History of the United States a “devious narrative”