Assimilation

(from Race: The Power of an Illusion: The Story We Tell)
- Whites wanted Indians to be assimilated into America, and to make them farmers and live like the colonists. “They wanted to make us brown, white men.”
- Assimilating the Indians gave them more privilege because they were starting to become more like the whites, which was the preferred race. This then made them a more favorable group of people as compared to the whites.
- In Jefferson’s “Notes on the State of Virginia” he implied that Indians could be assimilated into American society. However, he did not support the assimilation of blacks in to American society. He wrote of deep-rooted prejudices entertained by the whites and of physical and moral differences separating the groups.