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For more than thirty years, histories of colonial interactions between Native American and European peoples in the French Northeast have benefited from the prominent inclusion of religious encounters. However, the majority of these narratives have diminished the relevance of religious considerations and relegated religion to a secondary role as a veneer or veil for motivations that scholars have deemed more rational, relevant, or pragmatic.
Erik R. Seeman addresses this historiographical deficiency by recognizing the impact of religiously rooted cosmologies and motivations and seriously considering the impact of religious exchange for the peoples of colonial New France. Through the metaphor of the Feast of the Dead and with special attention to each peoples' relation to bones, the text posits that similar customs and associations with death allowed both Wendats and French Catholics to recognize the common humanity of the other and served as a medium for communication throughout the history of Indian-Jesuit encounter. The Feast of the Dead offers a window through which Seeman reveals nuanced changes in the religious worlds and cultural relations of Native Americans by presenting the augmented meanings, conflicting identities, and social rifts that characterized their colonial experience. The text depicts the history of the Wendake,...