European Imperialism 1492

The European conquest of the new world was most commonly attributed to the superiority of the Europeans in all the facets of their confrontation. They had the superior weaponry, and were thought to have a superior intellect. After all, they were just bringing "civilization" to the new world, right? It sounds nice when you are learning about Columbus in grade school, but the traditional story is pretty far from the truth. The truth is that the Europeans, when they discovered this was a brand new world and not the spice islands, sought to rape the land for its gold and natural resources and enslave the Amerindians (native Americans), who were regarded to

America, land of the free, home of the brave, unless you’re not white. The United States of America was built on immigrants, but the more proper term would be imperialists. It is widely known that Native Americans were here first, but they barely acknowledge it. Instead children are taught about Christopher Columbus, the pilgrims, and the founding fathers. Colonists felt the need to kill, annex, and annihilate an entire culture to capitalize off of “undiscovered” lands. As a result, Native American culture is almost extinct, the impact that colonists had on Native Americans were catastrophic; natives were forced to change their way of life and culture to adjust to new conquerors brought by Columbus, when westerners kept pushing west, battles and massacres ensued and Natives were forced to assimilate into American culture. Native Americans are still ignored and are pushed to the back burner. We claim that we are progressive, but the Dakota Pipeline Project seems to contradict that statement. Today, we still aren’t progressing and it shows when we still have a holiday celebrating Christopher Columbus “discovering” the new world.

The Old World brought along diseases and forced labor, the deadly causes that took the lives of millions of Native Americans, however, the Spanish and Portuguese can only take responsibility for one of these deadly causes. The spreading of smallpox, measles, bubonic plague, etc., were not intentional. The europeans, immuned to most of the diseases that spread throughout the Native American communities, were unaware of the germs that they had carried over to the New World. The diseases allowed the conquistadores to quickly conquer various areas in the Americas, but left 90% of the Native population dead. On the other hand, the Spanish and Portuguese are responsible for enforcing labor unto the Native Americans. Native Americans worked as sex slaves or forced to mine for precious metals to feed Europe’s economy. Besides that, the plantations in which African slaves worked on occupied the Native American’s territory, causing disruption to their land.

For centuries, European nations had been trading slaves, gold, ivory, and more with the west coast of Africa. Throughout the early 1800s, Europeans barely knew anything about the rest of the country of Africa. This quickly changed as Europe grew a sudden interest in exploring the rest of the country and taking advantage of their many valuable resources. Many wonder what motivated Europeans to Imperialize Africa, or extend their country’s power throughout Africa. The driving forces behind European Imperialism in Africa were the strive for ultimate power in Africa between competing countries, the need for money and technological advancements in European civilizations, and the constant attempt for Europeans to spread their cultures throughout

Between the period from 1880 to 1914, European powers went after overseas empires in Africa. The governments and political leaders of the European powers believed that this colonization of the African empires was necessary to maintain their global influence. A second group of people supposed that African colonization was the result of the greedy Capitalists who \only cared for new resources and markets. The third group of people claimed it to be their job to enlighten and educate the uncivilized people of Africa. Although the political leaders of European powers encouraged colonization of African empires to advance their nation’s global influence, others argued that it was only for the profiteering of the Capitalists who sought new

Throughout the history of the world, imperialism has played a major role. Imperialism is one country’s complete domination of the political, economic, and social life of another country. Imperialism has many positive and negative effects. The Age of Imperialism is considered 1800 - 1914. During this time Europe became a major world leader. European countries set up colonies all over Africa, Latin America, and Asia, and encouraged their citizens to populate them. European imperialism boosted Europe’s economy, and made them a world power. Imperialization had an entirely different effect on Africa, Latin America, and Asia. People of these countries were mistreated, they lost their culture, land, and self respect. The negative effects of

Imperial powers have a long tradition of exploiting less powerful states for political and economic gain. We see this throughout much of history, from early warlords demanding tribute from weaker rulers, and arguably even today in the United States. Citizens in places such as Guam must pay taxes and are subject to the draft, and yet can only vote for a non-voting member of congress. Evidence of exploitation are myriad across much of human history. Perhaps the most widespread examples, however, are those of the Colonial period, during the 1500s through the 1700s, and the New Imperial period, of the late 1800s.

The Spanish war gave the United States an empire. At the end of the Spanish war the United States took Spanish colonies such as Puerto Rico, the Philippines, and many other islands. The creation of the American Empire leads to the end of the Spanish Empire. The United States wanted to build up the countries so that markets would open up and purchase American goods and to improve the American economy.

The founding of the New World fascinated many Europeans because of the possibilities of the economic, political, and social growth. Europeans packed their belongings and boarded the boat to new beginnings. Arriving in the Americas was not what they had expected. Already pre-occupied in the land, were the Native Americans. The Native Americans refused the Europeans colonization in the America’s, but not all colonies in the Europe just wanted to colonize with the Natives. The intentions of the Europeans colonies were all different, as the Dutch solely came for business transactions. The Dutch business transactions resulted in the change of economic, political, and social movements, changing the lives of the Native’s.

The indigenous people of Africa suffered many setbacks, when the Europeans arrived. When the Europeans arrived in Africa they made the indigenous people feel inferior, lack self-confidence, and be stripped of their responsibility. As shown by Document 2, when it says, “...convince us that our civilization was nothing less than savagery, thus giving us complexes which led to our being branded as irresponsible and lacking in self-confidence.” Some people may agree, that this seems like something out of a genocide. Originally the indigenous people of Africa were supposed to be cheap labor. However, this soon changed when the Europeans enslaved the African people. This is portrayed in Document 6, when it says, “...Beneath the noonday sun, My brother was strong…” By doing this they stole all of the human rights from the Africans, who had done nothing wrong. This is shown in Document 3, when it says, “Whereas fundamental human rights...are denied to Africans.” During this extremely horrific time in African history men were worked to death, and women were raped. This is found in Document 6, when it says,”The White Man killed my father,My father was proud, The White Man seduced my mother, My mother was beautiful.” This shows the negative effects are much worse for the Africans, than for the Europeans. But, there are some positives in this dark hour. When the Europeans arrived in Africa, they provided the

Influence of European Imperialism Known as the “New Imperialism,” this aggressive expansion was the turning point of an old era. European powers such as Britain, Russia, and France began to grab parts of Africa and Asia. It brought about sudden changes to the ancient empires and kingdoms of the Eastern Hemisphere. Most of these changes gave blessing to a new age of modernization.

Anybody would be hard pressed to find a term associated with political geography with a worse connotation than imperialism. A word that encompasses the bloodiest of history, and is usually used in conjunction with colonialism and the stripping of all things deemed valuable from a foreign land. Specifically in Latin America, imperialism has been an economic death sentence since Columbus landed in 1492. Latin America has been depleted of raw materials and its natural resources by western conquerors (mostly Spain, Portugal, and the United States) for more than a half a century.

The Europeans all scrambled to colonize Africa for t’s raw materials and land. THey had justified it as the White Man’s burden. They believed that is was their responsibility as a more developed race to help Africa catch up in technology, government, economics etc. Rhodes even said, “-and that the more of the world we inhabit, the better it is for the human race.” (Doc, 1) With this mindset, Europeans colonized Africa and started to export raw materials such as rubber, diamonds, gold, palm oil etc. White man’s burden led to Imperialism because they thought taking over other countries was the only to help them move forward. In doing so, they also spread their power and influence throughout the world. The White man's burden was also accompanied

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.

“What do I think of Western civilization? I think it would be a very good idea.” – Mahatma Gandhi