Untitled - Istituto di Storia dell'Europa Mediterranea - Cnr

10. THE FRUSTRATING SEARCH FOR THE PERFECT INDIAN:
JOËLLE ROSTKOWSKI'S UNACCOMPLISHED CONVERSIONS
European scholars seem to have outgrown their sense of guilt for the
wrongdoings of their ancestors. Following in the steps of their North
American colleagues, they have begun to leave their moral tirades
aside and to concentrate on more analytical and discerning
monographs. La conversion inachevée, written by French
ethnohistorian Joëlle Rostkowski, is then a most welcome addition to
the recent European literature on the American aboriginal peoples. 1
Rostkowski studies the impact of Christian missionary efforts on
two well known nations, the Pueblo and the Sioux. In spite of their
significant differences, Rostkowski dearly shows the similarity of
their spiritual systems of values and of their reactions to the Christian
message. According to Rostkowski, by concentrating on the
traditional religions and by desperately searching for the "Indien
hiératique et figé, résistant farouchement à l'acculturation,
miraculeusement préservé des métissages spirituels" (302, also 26),
anthropologists lost sight of the fact that the Christian Gospel was
quite easily accepted by the aboriginal peoples (41). The spread of
Christianity, however, did not imply outright conversion, that is,
according to Rostkowski, a "changement radical de la conduite morale
et religieuse" and the abandonment of aboriginal values (41). This is
why the author maintains that the process of conversion has been and
still is incomplete ("inachévée" [41, also 26]). In fact, Christian
churches replaced a policy of eradication of aboriginal beliefs with the
doctrine of "inculturation," one that accepts traditional religions as a
source of spiritual enrichment and, in practice, encourages aboriginal
peoples to participate in both spiritual systems, aboriginal and
Christian (15, 42, 162, 283, 343, 350, 360). The chapters on the Sioux
are the best of the entire book (218-238, 287-321).
1
Joëlle Rostkowski, La conversion inachevée. Les Indiens et le christianisme (Paris:
Albin Michel, 1998).