This led to Indian suffrage and deaths of thousands of Native Americans. The Indians called this the trail of tears, describing it as a journey that sickened and starved them. Some Indians tribes, like the Cherokees, tried to resist the acts and made treaties to protect them. But they were brutally harassed and angered. Indians depicted it as becoming denationalized as document H explains.
Eventually the Pueblos blamed the Spanish for their hardships and misfortunes because of the fact that the Spanish had, in a sense, outlawed their ancient rituals and ceremonies. The Pueblos began to practice their ancient rituals. This was met with great oppression from the Spanish. They hanged three Pueblo religious leaders and whipped many others. This eventually led to a synchronized revolt against Spain.
Coronado’s expedition of 1512 through the Southwest constituted Spain’s first contact with the Indians. Once again, expansionism and religious intolerance lead to the oppression of the indigenous people. Until the 1600’s, North America was a useless wasteland with nothing to offer to the Spanish, but South and Central America was fully subjected under European rule. So expansionism drove the Spanish northwards to conquer even more land. The Spanish began to crush the Southwest Indians military, enslave and Christianize them.
Despite the documentary many Europeans were killed during these massacres as well as Indians. The director not showing the Europeans being killed is a form of selection of detail. This takes away our traditional views of Indians from the old Cowboy and Indian movies where Indians kidnapped women and children and the white people were there savior. When the Europeans settled in America they tried to recreate Britain in this land but the climate, plants and animals were totally different so they were upsetting the natural ecosystem of the land. Whereas this is what the Indians had successfully not done by harvesting only what they need.
As a nation, America should be proud of the first people that lived there, and should embrace Native Americans as a part of our history. However, this has not always been the way that America looks at Native Americans, as this country went through a time in the late 19th century when we wanted to eradicate their entire population, and take all their land for ourselves and our westward expansion. Because of these selfish, inhumane ideas, terrible things like The Trail of Tears happened, and if Indian tribes were not being killed, they were being converted by force. One of the things that suffered along with the Native American cultures and tribes, was their languages. These beautiful, sophisticated
In conclusion I believe that the Europeans brought scalping to the natives when they came to colonize. Scalping is a very harsh act that took place up until the 19th century with the last people to do it being the Natives. Although the Europeans introduced scalping, the Natives continued the tradition. Both sides are equally as guilty of this harsh
Before enrolling in American Indian Studies 475 I had known that Columbus had not discovered America. I knew that he had landed in what he thought was India and named the local people Indians. What I did not know was where he had actually landed and the destruction he had caused to the local people. Although at first, the deaths were accidental due to lack of immunity to the disease brought by Columbus and his men, the trip slowly turned into one that resulted in essentially the extinction of what Columbus called the Arawak peoples. I think what drew me most to this topic, was the lack of knowledge we have about who Christopher Columbus was, and the atrocities he committed.
The Indians’ New World By: James H. Merrell The Indians’ New World, by James Merrell, is an article that was meant to describe how the lives of the Native Americans were greatly impacted when European settlers invaded their land. This article shows how the natives were excluded from the New World because, unlike the settlers and slaves brought to the New World, they had already been there. The natives were experiencing most of what the new settlers and slavers were, they were forces to adapt to the changes in the New World because it was slowly becoming less familiar to them with all the changes the Europeans made. The Indians’ New World shows that, although the natives had already lived in America for quite some time, the world they were living in once the Europeans arrived was not just as new to them as it was to the settlers but it was also more harmful for their ways of life. One of the main ideas of this article was to open the read’s eyes to how many hardships the natives had to face starting with the rapid destruction of their population.
In addition to that, Christopher Columbus was uncaring and cruel. He mistreated Native Americans when they tried to be friendly to him and his crew. He killed/slaughtered many Native Americans and slaves and is responsible for one of the greatest genocides in the history of mankind. Over the years, children have been taught by their parents, teachers, textbooks that Christopher Columbus “discovered” America. A large portion of the world disagrees with that statement and argues that he, in fact, did NOT “discover” America and that he should not be credited for that.
They had no decent terrain to grow crops and the Native Americans were hostile to some colonists. It seemed that things were just not going to go right for them. Then, when the Native Americans accepted the colonists and gave them their own land, the colonists formed the thirteen American Colonies. But, the colonies were still oppressed under the king’s rule. This made almost every American upset, almost to the point of revolt, but