The Last of the Mohicans: Logos 2 key examples

Hawkeye compares the scalp to "the leaf [page] of a book, and each hair a letter." One of the racist arguments against Indigenous rights in the United States and around the world was that their illiteracy meant that they lacked intelligence. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the emerging field of anthropology claimed that reading and writing (technologies that were much more common in Europe than in many other societies around the world) signified a more evolved species of human. Hawkeye's simile allows him to reframe the practice of "reading" a scalp as a form of literacy. Using logos, or a persuasive appeal to logic, he suggests that, in fact, American Indians are better readers than "Christian whites" in certain contexts.

Hawkeye's argument still depends on the Euro-centric assumption that literacy is a sign of evolved intelligence. Furthermore, Cooper does not necessarily provide an accurate view of the complex cultural customs surrounding the removal of scalps and other body parts from enemies' bodies. Still, Cooper seems to be speaking through Hawkeye to implore white readers not to dismiss American Indians' intelligence and humanity outright.

Hawkeye is speaking for Cooper, who is addressing common misconceptions among white people about American Indians and religion. Hawkeye tells David that he is wrong: in fact, "even the Mingo" (one of the enemies in this novel) worships the same God as Christians. He claims that sometimes Mingoes and other American Indians make deals with the devil, but only because the devil cannot be vanquished in their society. Even white Christians would do the same, he argues. He tells David that just because American Indian representations of God do not look like the image of a white person does not mean that American Indian people do not look up to "the Great and Good Spirit only." In fact, he states, it is "shameful" that white men have attempted to trick American Indians into believing that God looks like them.

Hawkeye's picture of American Indian religion is simplistic and in some senses downright inaccurate. Nonetheless, Cooper gives him a soapbox in order to push back on a dominant Christian narrative about the "wickedness" of American Indians simply because their religious practices look different from white Christian religious practices. Hawkeye's choice to defend the Mingoes, who are holding Cora and Alice captive, demonstrates just how important it is to Cooper to refute this narrative. It also demonstrates Hawkeye's moral character: he is a principled person who refuses to let people sully even his enemies on false grounds.