Medicine Man to Missionary: Missionaries as Agents of Change among the Indians of Southern Ontario, 1789-1867

Notes: "With the exception of the Hurons in the 1640s the native peoples of present-day southern Ontario consistently opposed Christianity. Then suddenly in the mid-1820's thousands joined Christian churches. In 'Medicine Man to Missionary' Elizabeth Graham first reviews how the European missionaries finally converted the Indians, and then proceeds 'to study the role of missionaries in the development of the Indian reserve communities of southern Ontario'. Dr. Graham's book is based on her PhD thesis in anthropology recently completed at the University of Toronto" (p. 118). "[O]ne serious shortcoming of the study should be pointed out. The weakness lies in the methodology. As the author herself confesses on page one, this 'book relies entirely on historical documents'. Why an anthropologist would choose to examine only the onesided documentary record baffles this reviewer. Even the historians of non-literate societies have begin consulting those aged members of native communities who have been handed down, unbroken, their peoples' oral traditions" (p. 119).

Subjects: Indians of North America - Missions - Ontario - Book reviews; Indians of North America - Ontario - Social life and customs - Book reviews; Native peoples - Ontario - Missions - History - Book reviews; Native peoples - Ontario - Social life and customs - Book reviews