The History Of American Indians

These native peoples, first mislabeled as Indians by an explorer named Christopher Columbus, divided themselves into many different tribes, each with its own government, language, traditions and religions. Europeans, who slowly poured into the Indian's land, did not respect the Indians beliefs, interrupted their peaceful life and would do almost anything to get the land to them selves. The settlers also believed the land that both the Indians and the settlers lived on was theirs to themselves. They began to push the Native Americans off of their own land. Many of them fought back to keep their homes, some succeeded, some didn't.

Cherokee Indians have been around for many years, but when the topic of Native Americans is discussed it is only about the struggles and hardships they went through but never their actual culture of how and where they originated or how they came to be. There are many interesting things to learn about Cherokee Indians such as their heritage, religion, language, and their traditional songs, dances, and food.

A general history of Native Americans has been a part of my education for as long as I can remember. I remember how during the week before Thanksgiving, my 1st grade class did a skit about the “First Thanksgiving”. In order to look like Indians we made vests out of paper grocery bags and crumpled them up to look like leather and drew on them with crayons. When I think of my education of Native American culture, I think of going to North Pacific Reservations and seeing 10-12 ft tall totem poles with the shapes of animals carved into them. Most of the Native American tribes that I have learned about have been Western United States tribes because I grew up in California. When I read the list of Wisconsin Native

Native Americans were the first environmentalists and horticulturists. They were the spirit world was embodied in every part of the natural world, whether animal, vegetable or mineral. Survived by being big game hunters and/or fisherman. They would settle in different regions and form independent tribes with distinct Indian cultures. According to Bible Scripture, by 1492 there were over 300 Native American languages. Native Americans left so much history for people today and how America got started. Many people don't realize how much the Indians achieved during the time.

Native American culture originated in some parts North America. These countries are known as the United States of America and some parts of Canada. In the United States, there are 6.6 million Native Americans, which form about 2.0 percent of the population (Bureau, 2016). Europe had realized there were about 50 million people already living the “new world” and these people were called Native Americans. Native Americans were originally called Indians, but later through history they formed a new name. These people were called this because of them being native to the “new world” and the American part came after the colonist named the United States. Throughout history, Native Americans believed that using raw material in nature was the best way to provide for their people. Their culture thought no part of an animal should go to waste. They would eat the meat, use the skin for clothing, and make jewelry from the bones. Over the years a lot of their culture and customs were lost due to conforming with society. Their languages were referred to as “Indigenous Languages” because of them being extremely complicated and diverse. Some important factors that help understand the foundation of Native American culture are their rituals/practices, death ceremonies, holidays, family, and stereotypes.

The Native Americans lived on millions of acres of land in Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina and Florida, they inherited all of these lands from their ancestors who cultivated for generations. According to Elias Boudinot the natives considered themselves to be just as equal as the Whites, he states, “What is an Indian? Is he not formed of the same materials with yourself?” (Boudinot, 1826) The natives saw themselves to be no different from the Whites, in fact they cared for one another as a whole, they lived in kinships, where there was never an Indian left alone without a family. They followed a society based off of the concept of interdependence, they had in their mind that everything is dependent of something. The Indians were very advanced, and were able to prosper in their society, although the Whites believed otherwise, and believed that the natives were uncivilized.

One famous Indian tribe is the Cherokee. The Cherokee are original residents of the American southwest region, but now they occupy most of Oklahoma.There are three recognized Cherokee tribes. Most Cherokee people speak English today, but many still speak the Cherokee language. Children had jobs to do after school just like men and women had their own jobs. Many Cherokee Indians died when president Andrew Jackson forced them to leave their homes in Georgia. In the following essay I will be talking about the Cherokee life before,during,and after the Westward Expansion.

What was later known as the United States of America was home to six to ten million American Indians that were separated into hundreds of tribes. Each tribe had different values, cultural strains, and beliefs. Throughout the years there were government polices against the American Indians. According to the book Strangers to These Shores the author states that American Indians are poor in income, employment, and housing (Parrillo, 206).

Native Americans were the first civilization in America this means that they do not know how things were made yet. That caused them to tell stories called myths about how the Earth came to be and how mountains were made. Myths got passed down from generation to generation and often got changed as the word passes on. These myths are still around and being told today but just as historical background to study them. Native American myths have common traits such as characters, morals, and the pattern of events; imply that Native Americans value land and life.

Throughout the films I have watched this semester, American Indians have been constructed and represented in many different ways. Throughout this semester, different films in different eras have led to stereotyping American Indians and poorly portraying the construction of Native life. At the beginning of this semester, films portrayed Indians as savages who couldn't kill a cowboy, but at the end of the semester, that stereotype changed into American Indians represented as helpless people who cannot be rescued from the alcoholism and distress found on reservations. The ways the Native Americans are portrayed in these films create an image that America views Indians in today's society. In the first films viewed in class, they created the life

Native Americans were the people of the land before English settlers claimed the United States as it is today. Throughout time they have been mistreated by white people and forced to be Americanized. Their culture has almost died with their people, and to this day their rights can be challenged as unjustified. Before the 1960’s, Native Americans were pretty much ignored by other groups of ethnicity, especially the whites. However, postwar of Vietnam sparked the American youth to protest politics, and Native Americans stood up for their civil rights as American people.

All humans are interested in their origins and trying to account for their existence through creation stories. Native Americans tribes are no different from the rest of humanity. The tribes’ stories explain how people came into existence, how they came to be live on the lands they do and the how people interact with nature and each other. These trends can be seen in the legends of three tribes hailing from New England to the Great Lakes Region.

believied that they were alowed to occupy it by the grace of the "Great Spirit",

American Indians is a native American inhabitants of North America. Paleo-Indians are the person who originally entered America and settled and they mainly lived in Mexico and South America. The three important things we need to know about American Indians prior to European invasion are the culture of Maya, Aztec, and the Anasazi.

The Indian does not exist. It is an imaginary figure, according to Daniel Francis (The Imaginary Indian), invented by Europeans that originated in Columbus's mistake, as he believed he had landed in the East Indies, and developed into fantasy. "Through the prism of white hopes, fears and prejudices, indigenous Americans would be seen to have lost contact with reality and to have become 'Indians'; that is anything non-Natives wanted them to be," (5). Thus they were attributed a wide range of conflicting characteristics, simultaneously seen as noble savages, full of stoicism, the last representatives of a dying race and blood-thirsty warriors, void of emotion and dull-witted, reflecting European