The Collected Writings of Samson Occom, Mohegan
Literature and Leadership in Eighteenth-Century Native America
By Samson Occom
2006
First Published
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This volume brings together for the first time the known writings of the pioneering Native American religious and political leader, intellectual, and author, Samson Occom (Mohegan; 1723-1792). The largest surviving archive of American Indian writing before Charles Eastman (Santee Sioux; 1858-1939), Occom's writings offer unparalleled views into a Native American intellectual and cultural universe in the era of colonialization and the early United States. His letters, sermons, journals, prose, petitions, and hymns—many of them never before published—document the emergence of pantribal political consciousness among the Native peoples of New England as well as Native efforts to adapt Christianity as a tool of decolonialization. Presenting previously unpublished and newly recovered writings, this collection more than doubles available Native American writing from before 1800.
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Author
Samson Occom
Author · 3 books
The Reverend Samson Occom (1723 – July 14, 1792; also misspelled as Occum and Alcom) was a member of the Mohegan nation, from near New London, Connecticut, who became a Presbyterian cleric. Occom was the first Native American to publish his writings in English, and also helped found several settlements, including what ultimately became known as the Brothertown Indians. Together with the missionary John Eliot, Occom became one of the foremost missionaries who cross-fertilised Native American communities with Christianized European culture.
