Cook's Impact On The Polyneasians

Colonization was detrimental to not only the physical bodies of the Native Americans, but to their minds as well. The shift in indigenous education was a destructive one; Western education completely overtook the indigenous education that had thrived for generations. Instead of allowing education to benefit both indigenous and European peoples, it was used as a tool to destroy indigenous culture. When the settlers from Europe and Spain first came to the Americas, “indigenous men and women articulated their petitions for more educational spaces” (Díaz 60). The attempt to share educational spaces was continuously rejected by the settlers in an attempt to spur assimilation instead of cooperation.

In the beginning, Hawaii was unknown to any humans. Polynesians eventually came across its islands, and decided to make it their home. In the early days, each island was ruled by a chief, and many times the islands were in conflict with each other. Centuries like this passed, but then "in 1782, [Queen Lili'uokalani's] cousin Kamehameha set out to conquer and unite the islands". Thirteen years later, in 1795, Kamehameha

The first missionaries arrived to the Hawaiian Islands in 1820 and made a lot of changes to Hawaii when they arrived, both good and bad. When the missionaries arrived to the islands they thought of the natives as savages. They all needed to become converts to followers of Christ, drop their own beliefs and pick up new ones. They also sought out to “civilize” the natives, by teaching them how to read and write, sing and Christianize them. Hiram Bingham and Asa Thurston were the first of many missionaries to arrive in Hawaii. The Queen at the time, Kaahumanu accepted the arrival of the missionaries from New England to teach their religion. Although there were many positive affects of missionary that came to the Hawaiian Islands, there

Hawaii’s short story had many important events one including the Great Mahele or the great land division. The Mahele was the division of Hawaii’s land that altered the Hawaiian lifestyle permanently never returning. According to Star Advertiser, the Mahele in place in 1848, the land divided into four categories, consisting of land owned by the king, ali’i, land set aside to purchase, and land worked by the maka’ainana. At the time, foreigners living in Hawaii was frequent, as many stayed for the “paradise lifestyle,” but as time went on, possessing land seemed as it should be legal and allowed. In Hawaii, natives believed that the land did not belong to people, but the land belonged to the gods and they thought the foreigners way of thinking was bizarre. However, Kamehameha III had a different perspective on this idea, for he wanted to ensure that no hostile takeovers or wars would break out if the foreigners were being neglected (Borreca). The Mahele did not benefit the Hawaiians because the interaction of foreigners left the Hawaiians with little

He needed to be clever in order to outsmart the other ali’i on the other islands. An example of Kamehameha’s intelligence is he kept the Kapu System, but expanded it (12). This system was a good idea because it was a set of rules of what people could and could not do. People who broke the kapu (law) would be punished with death or sacrificed to the gods. This stayed the same after the unification of Hawaii. Another example of Kamehameha’s brilliance is he taxed the ships when they came into the harbor (28). This was an appropriate tax because other nations were also doing the same. This tax went into effect after the unification of Hawaii as it was a good source of money for the

Culture wasn’t the only thing that the Europeans brought over to the Americas. Along with their customs and rules, came the diseases that the Native American’s have never been exposed to. The Europeans brought many communicable diseases such as small pox and measles which were transmitted to the Native Americans through trade goods or someone infected with them. This quickly annihilated most of the Native American population.

In 1492 Christopher Columbus “discovered” the New World. This “discovery” led to the colonization of the New World by several European nations. European nations, such as Great Britain, started colonization for a variety of reasons.

The first effect of European and Native contact is the spread of diseases. Since the Native Americans had been isolated for centuries, they did not have immunity to European and eventually African diseases.

BPQ#4: The colonial experience of Asian and African peoples during the long nineteenth century was somewhat similar to the earlier colonial experience in the Americas. The process of colonization in Africa and Asia occurred with similar missionary efforts to the missionary efforts “ in the Americas centuries earlier, as military defeat shook confidence in the old gods and local practices, fostering openness to new sources of supernatural power” (905). Yet, in the Americas, colonization resulted in higher rates of conversion to Christianity. Also, the impact of the Europeans, specifically their diseases, were much more devastating in the Americas. This was because the peoples of Africa and Asia had already been exposed at some level to European

Kamehameha established foreign advisers, he successfully made Hawaii an important pit stop for all foreigners .Kamehameha also made laws and a royal monopoly for the sandalwood trade to stop people from only cutting sandalwood

Ruth Cuthand’s Trading series also shows how contact impacted Indigenous lives and cultures. As the explanation on her website states, “Trading examines both sides of European trade. Trade brought new items that revolutionized Native life. . . The downside was the decimation of many tribes through disease. Diseases quickly spread, arriving even before Europeans” (Cuthand). While the Indigenous and non-Indigenous people may have been trading goods, they were also exchanging diseases that the other party had never been exposed to before. Although the Europeans may not have intended to expose Indigenous people to diseases that would prove deadly, it was a devastating consequence of contact and presently, is only one of the many negative consequences that occurred due to colonialism.

In the 1820’s Missionaries have been starting to visit Hawaii inspired by Henry Obookiah who the first Hawaiian Missionary. Henry Obookiah was a Hawaiian missionary that told the English about the Hawaiian religion and how it works, and it convinced the English to go and spread their religion. But not everything ended well according to the plan for the Hawaiians. People only notice the negative effects that the missionaries cause the Hawaiians to go through, but they miss the benefits that the missionaries gave the Hawaiians. Although the missionaries have brought negative effects to the Hawaiians, they also have given the Hawaiians some benefits with the new religion, new language, and new technology.

As a result to new people coming into colonizes Hawaii and its people, the Hawaiians suffered many consequences. Formerly, the Hawaiian Islands remained isolated from the rest of the world. Once they were tainted with outside contact, the Hawaiians quickly fell ill with disease causing their population to go on rapid decline. Smaller populations allowed the missionaries to eventually gain more control. Eventually hula was prohibited, as well as the language and other past times, the final straw coming down to Hawaii's illegal annexation. The Hawaiian culture was almost lost completely; but if so it would have been legitimate to the missionaries because they were indeed "helping" these indigenous peoples become less savage like and closer to God.

Historically the treatment of Native Americans has been highly problematic, especially throughout the colonization of the New World. Although, when colonising some Europeans took a merciful and sympathetic approach to the Native Americans, generally the treatment towards the indigenous people was not humane. Not only did the Native Americans die at the hand of the settlers, they also died from diseases that had been brought to the new world by explorers for which they had no immunity. In some cases diseases such as smallpox wiped out entire tribes. Together, the introduction of diseases and the actions of the European settlers had devastating effects on the Native Americans.

The exact nature of the encounters between Captain James Cook and the Polynesian natives of Hawaii as well as all interactions and exchanges between Europeans and native Polynesian peoples of the Pacific while Cook was exploring the islands of Hawaii and after has been investigated by anthropologists and historians for many years. Captain Cook died at the hand of Polynesian natives while he was at Hawaii in 1779. Marshall Sahlins stated that Cook was seen as the god Lono during the celebration of the Makahiki festival taking place at the time of Cook’s visit. Gananath Obeyesekere, in his noted work, The Apotheosis of Captain Cook: European Mythmaking in the Pacific, argues