America before the Europeans

I wish in a way I hadnt mentioned the wretched subject of colonialism, but since in the early days N.America was founded as a British Crown colony, it probably has significance. Certainly it is significant in the way it shaped the view of the settlers towards the indigenous population.
As I said before, in my view they simply were not interested in the culture of the Native Americans. And one reason for that was the overweening sense of the superiority of their own culture. Even their definitions of what actually constitutes a culture. What they wanted was land to colonize.

It is annoying that even today some still denounce the Indians as bloodthirsty child sacrificing savages who were worse than the whites. But frankly I just cant be bothered to argue the point. I think that after two world wars is a bit academic really.

 

:hurray:

I hope our turn comes soon! We have all kinds of rivers, canyons, mountains, etc. named for elk, but no elk. I think we were among the very first states to kill them all off. We used to have almost everything you find out west today.

 

Sig

Simply not true – immigrants have often moved into areas under their own authority, and ignored that of the native population. In Britain, we have had prehistoric migrations, then Celts, the Roman Empire, Anglo-Saxons, the Norse etc all brought their own political structures with them, set up new settlements etc. I mean it’s happened in many places around the world at many times.

I don’t understand why it seems so important to you to claim your ancestors (and therefore yourself) were not immigrants.

I can only think of two one it’s the kudos and the other is that someone claiming this might think it gives them a better position from which to criticise present day immigration into their country.

It would bypasses the ‘well you’re all immigrants’ argument.

I mean if you can establish that your ancestors (and by definition yourself) were not ‘immigrants’ but ‘settlers’ that worked hard to hack out a new world and through guts and perseverance set up the ‘state’ then it is easier to criticise immigrants that didn’t and are not doing that.

It can give an impression of the deserving and undeserving, the ones that worked to build the nation and establish its systems the ‘true’ inhabitants and the ones that are just come and are coming after.

Personally I don’t think that works because it’s impossible to claim that the Europeans settlers of the Americas were not immigrants, the term European establishes that - they emigrated from Europe and migrated to become immigrants in the Americas.

 

Thank you! I didn't have copies of any of these, but most of the originals are in the history museums in Manteo and Williamsburg (VA). There is also a classic outdoor drama in Manteo called The Lost Colony which runs every summer. Their costumes and sets are based mostly on John White's artwork. The script hasn't been updated to reflect the latest discoveries by historians, but I think the drama does an excellent job of depicting the general nature of the local Indians and their early interactions with the English settlers. (Andy Griffith's first role as a paid, professional actor was in this production.)

Roanoke Island presented a somewhat unusual situation for Native Americans along the US Southeast coast. Roanoke isn't a barrier island, so it isn't highly susceptible to major storm damage. During hurricanes, it used to be common for low, thin barrier islands (little more than sandbars in the ocean) to be completely submerged without warning, and for new inlets to be created as others were closed. Roanoke was naturally protected from all this.

Today, the NC-DOT spends a fortune every year maintaining artificial sand dunes just above the high tide line on our barrier islands, and the inlets are dredged regularly.

In addition to weather advantages, not only was it easier to defend a small island from invasion, but the local tribe was also able to control the island's population of small vegetarian mammals such as raccoons, who love to raid agricultural fields at night. Surrounding shallow waters were easy to cross in canoes, when they wanted to hunt on the mainland, where wildlife was much more plentiful. Also, the nearest barrier island is located on a major migration route for large birds of many kinds. Very few tribes had a similar situation.

The Algonquins, like the Hatteras Indians and the Town Creek Indians (Mount Gilead), were semi-autonomous tribes under the regional authority of the Tuscarora leadership. There were many other such small tribes in eastern NC and SC, where a local chief managed day-to-day village life. This pragmatic political structure provided regional stability and peace, until the English disturbed it. The Tuscarora approach largely prevented massacres like the one in Chesapeake, VA, and endless local skirmishes over hunting rights. They also used their considerable political skills and experience to maintain alliances with several tribes in the eastern Great Lakes region, their ancestral home, to which they eventually returned.

The Cherokee approach was much different. Mountain land was considered the least desirable to live on, and the most easily defended, so Cherokee territory was never a tempting target for takeover by other tribes. With less time and effort devoted to war and war preparations, Cherokees used that time to fine-tune their specialized mountain survival skills, and to build a more advanced culture than any of the other Southeastern tribes, with which they had little interaction.

I think that today, we are tempted to look at Indian hunting grounds of the past and think of them as unused land, just as the early English settlers did. Nothing could be further from the truth, since it takes many tens of thousands of acres to naturally produce animals as fast as a small village can kill and eat them. The land was in use, but not in a way that was obvious. The NC natives were very good at managing their year-round food supply. As the Lost Colony residents learned that first winter, when they almost starved to death, it wasn't as easy as it appeared to the uninitiated.

The English were used to thinking in terms of fenced pastures and efficient, productive herds of domesticated animals, but that requires near-perfect security of property, and a huge investment of effort up-front, cutting trees and building fences and barns. It works better than hunting where land is in limited supply, like in the English villages these people came from in the 16th century.

 

While you are technically correct, but slightly off topic , the debate of "deserving versus undeserving" immigrants and citizens isn't the debate America needs to be having right now.

At some point, every society and nation has to deal with immigration and border security issues. They have to decide for themselves whether or not the current immigration situation is in their best interest, at that moment. The past is the past. If they are in a detrimental situation, they need to come up with a plan to change it.

If there is any obvious lesson to be learned from the story of the Native Americans, it is that uncontrolled immigration can have catastrophic results. Those native tribes pretty much lost everything.

 

You are correct, of course, when it comes to every nation having to deal with immigration at some point. That said, I think the time for America to deal with the question has come on gone. The issue is being forced now, and no real discussion is taking place. Lines are being drawn, as with every other "hot" issue at the moment. I feel like it is all slowly building towards a crescendo.

Ehhh, that really isn't the same thing as we are discussing here.

 

I hope that one day in my lifetime, the grizzly gets reintroduced California. It's kind of sad how their flag has a grizzly and there's none that exist there. It's also sad its the golden state and it's illegal to mine gold there too.

 

I'm trying to tie everything back to the OP. Compare the surviving Indian reservations of today to the North America of 1492, and you won't find any similarities. None.

Where I live, there isn't a clue that natives ever lived here, unless you happen to find an arrowhead in a field. That's fairly typical of American cities.

 

Immigrant, settler I fail to see a difference!?

Yes our founders ignored the native americans and their culture; our government has also prosecuted Africans, hippies and, drug users. The native Americans being the only religion allowed to use peyote..

But if we truly believe in religious freedom, why can't I join the native Americans religion?

Why can't I make a religion that uses Marijuana as the bible says "Use my plants as medication?"

Why can't we?

Cause it'd be devastating to pharmaceutical industries, Mexican cartels and others who lobby our government, to dictate the conduct of others...

 

So what? I don't think that is the result of uncontrolled immigration. Instead, it is the result of various tribes being conquered, displaced, or just plain old wiped out. If it was uncontrolled immigration I would expect to have seen European colonists as a whole merge with these tribes and change them from within, instead of living separate existences.

 

It has been pretty thoroughly explained.

 

Well it's the same damn thing to me.

Immigration-

• The action of coming to live permanently in a foreign country.
• A government department dealing with applications from foreign citizens who wish to live in a particular country.

set·tler

/ˈsetl-ər/
Noun
A person who settles in an area, typically one with no or few previous inhabitants.

Synonyms
colonist - colonizer


And we were colonists soo imo it can go either way. There were people in this country when we got here, but no hiarchy, and no government.Again, imo it could go either way..

 

Karen

Hi how are you?

And the Neanderthals did lose everything.

In a lot of ways it depends on how ‘raw’ historical events are. The Viking involvement in the British Isles was that first they arrived as raiders and pirates, later they immigrated here as conquerors and settlers and then became a valuable contribution to ‘British’ society. But before that I’m sure the Anglo-Saxons, Scots, Picts and Irish that were on the receiving end of a Norse axe probably thought it was pretty damned catastrophic.

Here is the Viking Report from the wonderful Horrible Histories -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCgiQVEoHE0"]Horrible Histories - The Viking Report - YouTube

The thing is that invasion and immigration (both voluntary and forced) are still ‘recent’ subjects in places like the Americas, Africa and Australia.

I’m not trying to play light of the subject of present day immigration but let’s review the issue in a thousand years time.

 

Sig

Lines are being drawn - building to a crescendo

Oh and there is that threat/fear mentality again.

What kind of crescendo?

Anyway as I’ve said above it depends how you look at things in a historical prospective.

I was listening to a report last night about how in a lot of ways Hispanics are becoming the driving force behind the US economy they’re the ones now pushing it forward (just as other immigrant groups have in the past).

In the long run does it matter if Spanish became the dominant language?

 

yes it matters if you speak english and dont want to speak spanish. Being a minority sucks anyone with any sense doesn't wish to be powerless and oppressed, thats why you have seperate nations because people wish to have their own cultures which traditionally they have fought to the death to defend .

This is perfectly natural, all animal species fight for resources even within species there is a deadly fight for resources and territory, we are animals why you would think we should behave any different and not be territorial I dont know .

multi ethnic multi cultural states have a habit of falling apart normally when the former majority starts to become the minority, I would imagine the usa will go the same way as the former yugoslavia at some point .

In europe and the uk we are creating the balkans with gay abandon

 

Same forum? Same thread?

Yes, because that would be similar to what we did to the Native American cultures. If it was morally wrong for us to do it to them, then it's wrong for another group to do it to us. Ultimately, English American literature, music, and culture would fade away, almost as if it had never existed.

Having to learn to speak Spanish would make me feel like a victim of racism, since I didn't choose to move to a Spanish-speaking country. I'm sure the Tuscaroras resented having to learn English, for similar reasons.

I don't understand the Hispanic attitude about English. If I decided to move to Germany, I would assume that I would need to learn how to speak German. They don't owe me any favors or special treatment. To me, that's common sense thinking.

When Mexicans first started moving into this state in significant numbers, they would drive through the streets of the town where I lived, playing Spanish language music as loud as possible, through giant speakers pointed out the back windows. I can't respect that. I can't imagine moving somewhere and doing things to intentionally offend the locals.

But...history is made mostly by people who don't mind offending others, so I guess I'm on the losing side. As usual.