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Roger Williams Impact On Shaping America

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Each and every day, people take monumental journeys that lead them to a position of learning, discovery, and impact. There are many people who have had an impact on shaping America to what it is today, and one of those people is Roger Williams. He had an impact because using both prose and poetry, he conducted ethnographic studies of Native American languages and translated them, and another good deed he did was being an advocate for church and state. (Moore et al., n.d.) According to “The Enduring Legacy of Roger Williams: Consulting America’s First Separationist on Today’s Pressing Church-State Controversies.” Journal of Church & State by Derek H. Davis, Roger Williams arrived in Massachusetts from England in 1631 to take up the position of a Puritan pastor. He was banished in 1635 as a result of criticism from the Massachusetts Bay Colony elites who had established a theocratic political order, because he opposed the imposition of religious requirements for holding public office, the requirement that all citizens take an oath to God, and that all citizens attend church on a regular basis. Roger Williams believed that the colony had misunderstood what the Bible had to say about the separate roles of church and state in society. (Davis 203) He was concerned about safeguarding …show more content…

He concentrated on translating Narragansett, a form of Native American language that was assimilated into modern English, using words like moose, squash, and quahog that are still in use today. Since William's "A Key into the Language of America" was a synthesis of poetry and prose, a historical document, an ethnographic analysis, and it is clear that he produced an unappreciated work of early American Literature. (Moore et al.,

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