|
|
T.J. Curley Soc. 442 Final Paper 11.20.03 The Oppression of Native Americans Through out the history when humans walked the earth there always has been a dominant group trying to convert people different from them into sharing their beliefs and cultures. There has been many different process that these dominant groups have tried to convert their sub dominant groups, and many times through out history this has led to oppression of the sub dominant group. This was no different among the Native Americans. Living peacefully before the Europeans settlers arrived in the Americas the natives at the time led a plain, ritualistic type of life. At this time the Native Americans were the dominant group of the Americas. Only when these settlers arrived did the lives of these natives change drastically. In the beginning of these two groups meeting there was tension but both managed to corporate with each other, but as the settlers began to get comfortable with there surroundings things would start to change. These settlers, who in large part were explorers from Western Europe, would start to demand change and eventually this would lead to a great oppression of these native people. There were many groups or tribes of Native Americans back at the time when this oppression started, some are still here and some are long forgotten but all at some point were oppressed by these white explorers. At the present time this oppression is largely exterminated but in the past it held a large race of people back for centuries. In the following report the many years of oppression, the reasons this oppression started, and today’s current involvement with these Native Americans will be fully examined and explained. First we will take a look into the lives of the natives of America pre dating the settling from Europeans and their attempt of conforming the ways of Indians. These Native Americans “have long been known as Indians because of the belief prevalent to the time of Columbus that the Americas were the outer reaches of the Indies.” (#1 2001 Native Americans) This will incorporate the time before the oppression of this group such as the times when the settlers lived along side with the Native Americans and even farther back in history before the settlers were even involved, when it was just the Indians living free. As previously stated there were many tribes of Native Americans living in the western hemisphere. These groups were spread all over the Americas, north and south, but we are going to focus on the groups that lived in the present day United States. These tribes spread all the way from the northwest coast, now called Washington State and upper California, all the way to the eastern woodlands of present day New York. The Indians that were sedentary, groups with permanent homes, lived in self built houses mostly made out of wood or adobe. Usually surviving off of subsistence farming, hunting and gathering, and fishing from the near by water source that most the sedentary groups lived by. There were also nomadic tribes that existed at this time. This was a group that lived moving from place to place relying on their environment to survive. The nomads were hunters and gathers, hunting bison, buffalo, or deer depending on their location. Their shelter would usually be teepees, which were generally bison or buffalo skins put together around 3 or more wooden poles that were easily transportable if the group had to get up and leave. Most of these Indians wore what they hunter. Wearing layers of deer or buffalo hide in the winter to keep warm and less in the summer months they only took what they needed. From the feet to their head most was made of these hides so nothing was wasted. These clothes were worn over the reddish-yellow skin that the majority of the Native Americans shared in common, also sharing straight dark hair and dark eyes. There were many means of travel used by different tribes of Indians. The canoe greatly increased travel speed for Indians located near a river or water bed. In some areas Indians were fortunate enough to have wild horses, these horses increased speed, distance, and the ability to carry belongings easier. And all Indians at one point depended on their feet as a method to travel from place to place. For a brief time in history Native Americans lived along side of the European settlers that eventually would be responsible for the start of their oppression. A very well documented account of this taking place is Thanksgiving, which is a well recognized national holiday. Believed to take place in the early 1600’s there are many theories about what took place between the two groups, but no matter what is believed that happened one account written on December 12, 1621 by an attendee of the event, William Bradford and it shows that the Native Americans and settlers did once get along, “…did prove well, and God be praised, we had a good increase of Indian corn, and our barley indifferent good, but our peas not worth the gathering, for we feared they were too late sown. They came up very well, and blossomed, but the sun parched them in the blossom. Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruit of our labors. They four in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the company almost a week. At which time, amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our governor, and upon the captain and others.
|
