Assimilating Indians During Westward Expansion

In the 1870s, the U.S. government enacted a policy of assimilation of Native Americans, to Americanize them. Their goal was to turn them into white men. Schools were an important part of facilitating their goal. In 1879, Richard Henry Pratt founded the Carlisle Indian School. It was the first school in which Native American children were culturally exposed to American ideology. The idea for the boarding school first came through treatment of Cheyenne warriors. In the 1860s, Americans were in the midst of a major western migration. Settlers were moving into the western region, pushing natives off lands, and in some cases, killing livestock. Warriors then took revenge on settlers and soldiers. General Sherman called for “the

During westward expansion, the Native Americans got kicked to the side. The settlers coming west often saw the Indians as a threat to them and their families. However, this was not the main reason the Indians were pushed aside. The settlers saw the Indians had fertile land and wanted it for themselves. The Indians were the opposite of what the settlers thought they were. The Indians often helped the people moving west across the plains; giving them food, supplies, and acting as guides. However, the U.S. Government did not see this side of the Indians, instead they forced the Indians onto reservations. During the time of the expansion of the United States to the present, the Native Americans went through many things so that the United States could expand; they were pushed onto reservations, and forced to give up their culture through the Ideas of Manifest Destiny and Social Darwinism.

When the Europeans and Spaniards first “discovered” North America all was well. The Indians at first were truly intrigued with the white man as the brought all sorts of new stuff to trade. Matter a fact the first set of settlers would not been able to survive without the help of the Indians. Unfortunately, the settlers had very little respect for the land and resources. The Europeans then starting using violence to get what they wanted and as the number of settlers increased the Indians new that they were in over their heads. With all the new settlers came diseases such as small pox and measles. These diseases hurt the Indian tribes severely, and with the ignorance the settler’s wars began; the Indian Wars, the Indian Removal Act, Wounded knee, and the trail of tears are only a few of the many. The U.S. Government took it upon themselves to start relocation programs, with these programs the Indians were ripped from their homes, required to speak only the language of the settlers and robbed of their customs. The children of the tribes were taken away and sent to special schools to Americanize them and forget about their heritage. Then in the late 1800’s the government started

The North saw Indians as uncivil people, therefore sending them to reservations to remove them from their “white” society. The North felt that either the Indians should be civilised, which they tried to promote through the Dawes Act, or that they should be removed from

America is often considered one of the most wealthy and powerful countries in the world. The United States is associated with global reverence and respect; however, could a nation so great preserve indigenous societies continuously impeding the country’s potential growth without giving up on aspirations of success and expansion? Would our country exist as the power symbol it is today without certain actions that removed the barriers preventing American expansion and growth? Although the aboriginal people of America had claimed their land before the settlement of white colonists, the Native Americans proved an impediment towards the ultimate growth in America’s economic and commercial power. However harsh the treatment of Native Americans

It isn't unheard for powerful empires to obliterate obstacles in the path of expansion. Mankind is never satiated with their appetite for expansion and growth, never satisfied with what they currently possess, always wanting what the people next door have. This has led to the demise of many extraordinary leaders, armies and nations like the Romans, Alexander the Great and Napoleon Bonaparte. But still, pioneers have and probably will always push forward to foreign lands, disregarding everything currently inhabiting it. Co-existing with another race or group of people has proven difficult time and time again to last for long without clashing. For these reasons, I am not the slightest bit surprised the United States expanded Westward on the large semi-barren frontier, even though Native Americans had lived there

I agree that the treatment of American Indians during the mid-1800s could be considered as ethnic cleansing. The value of land increased dramatically when cotton became the major product in the south. Many whites wanted to push west and acquired the Native American’s fertile soil. Still, many Native Americans had remained in the South. They adopted white Americans culture, attended to school, owned private property and formed constitutional, republican governments. Most southern whites, however, denounced the Indian civilization as a shame and believed the Indians could never be civilized. Although federal policy had been to respect the rights of American Indian to inhabit the land, President Andrew Jackson abandoned this policy and adopted

Caused the Indian population to move to the Indian Territories (Oklahoma). Indirectly caused almost 12.5% of the Indians to die while they were migrating to the West. Caused the Indians to lose their valuable lands and lose their houses,crops, and location that had a spiritual significance to them.The Indians were being pressured from both state and federal government which caused many conflicts with the Indians and started the Seminole war, and the Supreme court case of Nations vs Georgia, and Worcestor vs Georgia. This also caused many Christian missionaries to protest since many were teaching these Indians about the Christian religion. Allowed the Americans to obtain valuable Indian lands, and settle

In 1756, the European groups such as Britain decided to colonize North America, resulting in multiple legacies for the First Nation groups who occupied these areas. As the Europeans started to imperialize and colonize Canada in order to expand globalization, they believed their culture was superior to the First Nations, and by having a Eurocentric worldview, this resulted in the European empires deciding to assimilate the Aboriginal groups with the use of The Indian Act and residential schools. The Indian Act was established in 1876, the purpose of the act was to encourage assimilation. It encouraged assimilation by controlling the First Nations, the government controlled them by defining if they were a status Indian or not. Another action the act took to assimilate the Aboriginal groups trying to abolish their culture by banning their cultural practices. Lastly the act banned them from pursuing land in 1927, without consent from those on the Indian Affairs. Not only did the government use the Indian Act to assimilate the First Nations, they also used residential schools to help. Aboriginal children were forced and or taken away to attend these schools in the 1880s. The residential schools used abuse to make sure the children wouldn't follow their traditional ways, this resulted in them losing their history, language, and culture. By using paternalistic ways to assimilate, it created cultural erosion for the Aboriginal groups, leading to the loss of their culture. As years went on, it created a cycle of problems towards them, as they were not able to pass on their traditional culture to the next generation, thus making them now have to revitalize their culture to help preserve and affirm their culture again. With their Eurocentric views and wanting to expand their resources, the Europeans left their mark on Canada

During history, white settlers and the U.S. government did not always have the best of relationships. Many wars were fought, and many lives were lost from both sites. The U.S. government and white settlers has had negative attitudes toward the Native Americans. Native Americans were not seen as equal to white people, so white settlers and U.S. government did not treat them fairly. The United States government also tried assimilation as a solution to their “Native American problem.”

The Government forced them to be reeducated "in the values and dominant ways of American culture." Several thousand children were taken from their parents control and sent to schools where they were forced to “ stop dressing, speaking, thinking, and believing like Indians”. Half of the students were girls and it was important for the Native girls to learn their "new" culture. One way the Native girls were taught was they lived as house servants for white families. The goal of the program was to save the children by destroying the Indian but it was hard to deter children from their way of life. When the children disobeyed orders they would get punished. Trying to get the children to forget about their culture was very hard. There is a story of two girls who tried to run away, they were found and were beaten. Their legs would be tied as well as their hands behind their back. They were put in the hallways so if they fell asleep or something, the matron would whip them and make them stand up again. Parents fought to stop this coercive Americanization but they could not stop

In the name and cause of freedom and expansion, the lives and culture of Indians were taken away in order to benefit the whites. Indian children first went to boarding schools in 1860 to transform their culture into the white culture. The Indians felt threatened, because they were being pushed out of their territories from the miners’ trails and Mormons that had begun settling in Northern Utah. As a result of this conflict, a massacre took place which led to major changes in settlement of the Cache Valley territory.

The United States’ history is full of ethnocentric beliefs that have led to the ethnocentric development of the country. One of the most remote examples of this ethnocentric belief is displayed with the construction of off-reservation boarding schools for Native Americans first started in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, by former general, Richard Henry Pratt. The purpose of the schools was to strip Native Americans of their cultural traditions and teach them the skills necessary to function in American Society, according to Pratt. Pratt keyed this belief with the saying “Kill the Indian, save the man,” in order to justify his reasons to assimilate the Indians to the white culture (Mintz 2016). What Richard Henry Pratt did was wrong. The Indians should find self-actualization through their own cultural background, and become accepted throughout society for being the race they are. Many cease to accept that having assimilated the Indians was an act of racism. However, because racism is derived from the ethnocentric beliefs of an individual, people redefine it with something else.

In the beginning, the whites had enough land to satisfy their own needs. However, in enough time, the whites settlers started craving more and more land, because of their fast growing settlement and need for space. Instead of buying more territory, or trying to condense their already large settlements, the Whites suggested the idea to move the Indians to the west. As, there was gold found in the already fertile and animal-populated lands of the Natives, not many Whites argued against taking it. When White settler officials, such as generals, presented the idea of taking over the chunk of land, the government could not refuse, and decided to pass a law. The law stated that whites had the right to move Indians westward, and since they wanted

There were several cultural and spiritual differences between The Native Americans tribes and the European immigrants, but they were willing to live with the immigrants and try to adapt the new culture until the relationships were strained by the loss of their land and the diseases brought from the foreigners. Over time war broke out against the tribes who didn’t commit to the new found “civilized” culture. Tribes who resisted were forcefully removed by the Army and several were massacred before they could be forced to leave. It was then when President Andrew Jackson drafted up the Indian removal plan in 1893 that created the policy to remove or massacre all Indian Tribes.