Natives And The Colonization Of Native Americans In America

Before the Spanish ship that changed it all, which arrived in the “New World” in 1492, there was a vast population of native people who had lived on this land for centuries prior. That ship, skippered by Christopher Columbus, raised arguably one of the most influential turning points in Native American and European history. It sparked the fire of cultural diffusion in the New World which profoundly impacted the Native American peoples and the European settlers.

In 1492, Christopher Columbus landed in the new world; the Native Americans lives were altered through the introduction of the Columbian Exchange, Cultural changes and loss of their homeland. Columbus's discovery of the new world sparked colonization of the Americas. There was an ample amount of vast, arable land thus creating economic opportunity for the wealthy and the common-man. The people longing for this opportunity intruded on the Native American's land and completely changed their way of life.

Coming from an economic standpoint, the Europeans and Indians were such total opposites, it often led to misunderstanding. Indians had very large trading routes well before the time of European colonization. Their experience in trade only made it easier to exchange goods with the Europeans. For Indians, trading was a way to acquire goods they wanted, but also a way to share the wealth of their land with other tribes that didn't have the same items to trade as they did. To the

The Europeans and the Native American’s come from very different customs and cultures. The colonists had very

From the very first interaction, the social and political relations between the Native Americans and the Europeans had begun with much tension. Many Europeans came to the Americas with the intention of discovery. However, when it became apparent that these new lands were inhibited the motives changed, and then the natives were colonized, abused, and in many cases killed. From then and throughout the impending periods of time, the relations between the natives and the Europeans had a few points of mutual peacefulness, but were overall negative.

Native Americans never came in contact with diseases that developed in the Old World because they were separated from Asia, Africa, and Europe when ocean levels rose following the end of the last Ice Age. Diseases like smallpox, measles, pneumonia, influenza, and malaria were unknown to

In “Times are Altered with Us Indians by Colin Calloway,” Indian peoples are shown to have created thriving communities before the Europeans arrived in their lands. They had developed long histories, effective fishing, farming, and hunting techniques, political systems and social structures, hundreds of languages, had advanced culturally in the form of artwork and architecture, as well as have far reaching networks of trade and communication, way before Europeans had “discovered America.” Once Europeans had arrived however, they had caused Native Americans prosperity to falter. The most devastating cause of change for the Indians were diseases like smallpox, plague, measles, yellow fever, and influenza brought by the Europeans, and caused several tribes to be completely wiped out and some tribes to only have a few survivors. The diseases, as well as alcohol, caused the social and political structure to be affected negatively because elders, providers, family members, healers, and counselors perished so all the resources and knowledge in these people perished with them and were not able to be passed on to the survivors. Eventually, Indian life began to be taken over by European ideals as a way to survive, by converting to Christianity, trading with the Europeans, having the Europeans interfere in their politics, and having war-caused by the Europeans- ruin their remaining communities. Indians role in colonial America are different than they are portrayed in traditional

Beginning in the Sixteenth Century, Europeans sought to escape religious and class persecution by engaging on a journey to the New World. However, they were unaware that this “New World” was already inhabited by many groups of Native Americans, who had been established on the continent for thousands of years. At first, the two ethnic groups lived in relative peace. The colonists of Jamestown survived due to Powhatan’s tribe teaching them how to cultivate the land. However, things took a twisted turn as the colonists grew greedy. Due to cultural differences, there was stark tension between the Indian groups and European settlers in New England prior to 1750, which tremendously influenced early political means, social life, and the economy.

When they sailed across the Atlantic, they ended up in the Caribbean. This is where the Spaniards initiated slavery and forcibly worked a large amount of Indians to death, eventually replacing them with Africans. An example of Spaniards imposing slavery upon Natives was the creation of the encomienda system, which was used to effectively enslave the Indians and seize their land. They started marrying one another and producing mestizos, the offspring of a Spaniard and American Indian. Unfortunately, much of it was due to rape. The negative effects on the Indians were not only the consequence of their mistreatment; a vast amount of people died as a result of the Columbian Exchange, a transfer of animals, diseases, culture, ideas, and more. Specifically, when Europeans came to America, they brought over diseases such as smallpox, measles, and influenza. These illnesses were extremely detrimental for

The fascination with Native Americans has been a constant with outsiders since explorers first “discovered” the New World. The biggest surge in this fascination came in the mid-19th century when the Indian Wars were starting to come to an end and the belief that Native Americans were disappearing, walking into the sunset never to be seen again. This led to an increase in the collecting of anything Native American, from artifacts to stories to portraits. The inevitable outcome of this was that Native Americans, who were never considered very highly to begin with, where now moved into a category of scientific interest to be study. This scientific interest in Native Americans is what many museums and other institutions based their collections and exhibits on and is one of the issues that many Native Americans have with how both their people and their culture were, and to some extent still are, represented in these places.

Imagine a person bought something that the person valued. The person was the owner of the product and took good care of it.Then, all of a sudden, a stranger comes and takes that product and declares it “discovered”. Now since the stranger “discovered” it, the product now has to be shared among them. This is similar to what happened to Native Americans in North America. Native Americans owned and lived in North America for several thousand years. Then, all of a sudden, European explorers came to North America and claimed the land “discovered”. Europeans started moving into the land and later, started sharing the land. Encounters between Europeans and Native Americans in the colonial era led to the exchange of diseases with Native Americans,

Many prominent historians argue a clash between culture and religious philosophy was the primary cause of conflict between European settlers in North America and Native Americans. However, a closer analysis of American history suggests otherwise. While a clash in cultures and religious differences did exist, the European domination of Native Americans was primarily fueled by European economic motivations, a desire for valuable natural resources and a craving to expand the American colonial system. Due to this, the conflict was inevitable.

The indians had no immunity to the sickness that Europeans were bringing to their land. The most common ones were smallpox, influenza, measles, and chicken pox.[http://ncpedia.org/history/early/contact] The natives were not used to these diseases, their immune system was not prepared which resulted with the death of entire villages. sometimes the diseases were transmitted by making simple physical contact with the colonists. Other times, the sickness would spread as Indians traded with one another.

Ever since the discovery of Christopher Columbus, Europeans have been going to the Americas to find more land, wealth, and a place to show religion. But other competing countries wanted this land as well, making it hard for the Europeans to get along, even with the Native Americans. Soon enough, the Native Americans were used for the Europeans to work and mine. The impacts of the American indigenous people on the Europeans were effective. If the Native Americans hadn’t showed the Europeans, corn, then it would be one of the most popular harvested crop used in almost every food to this day. If they also haven’t showed the Europeans generally how to survive the Americas, then they would have turned out dead, and unable to conquer the new

According to the text, the author believes that the enmities between European settlers and Indians are unavoidable even if they seem to be friendly to each other at first. In my opinion, I agree with the author’s argument because from the historical events and trends, we can tell the excessive conflicts, especially beliefs on certain issues, lands and religion especially, and the external diseases, which reveal a radical age.