Exploring Indian Influence on Europeans

Richard Pointer, Westmont acting provost and Fletcher Jones Foundation professor in the social sciences, discusses how Native American life affected settlers in early America at a free, public talk, “Going Native: How Indians Changed Europeans in Early America,” Thursday, Nov. 12, at 5:30 p.m. at University Club, 1332 Santa Barbara Street.

Pointer says historians have long been aware that the encounter with Europeans affected all aspects of Native American life, but few have focused on the impact Indians made on the newcomers’ ways in these cross-cultural meetings. “My studies have shown that the religious encounter and flow of cultural influence between Indians and Euro-Americans was more often reciprocal than unidirectional,” Pointer says.

An American historian, Pointer has written two books, “Encounters of the Spirit: Native Americans and European Colonial Religion” and “Protestant Pluralism and the New York Experience,” as well as many articles. He joined Westmont’s history department in 1994 and was chosen social science division Teacher of the Year in 1997 and 2003. A member of the Phi Beta Kappa and Phi Kappa Phi honor societies, he has served as president and vice president of the Conference on Faith and History, an organization of Christian historians, and as associate editor for the Christian Scholar’s Review.

He graduated from Houghton College and earned his master’s degree and doctorate from Johns Hopkins University.

The lecture is part of Westmont Downtown: Conversations About Things that Matter, a lecture series sponsored by the Westmont Foundation, reaching out and engaging the larger Santa Barbara and Montecito communities.