Cronin must use the words of European observers and attempt to glean the facts about Native American behavior behind the tone of judgmental prose. Cronin admits that some of his history is impressionistic, to some degree, given that the hard data about the ecology of the Americas is not available to him, as even extant documents did not contain the meticulous detail he might have liked about the native land (Cronin 179). For example, in attempting to demonstrate how the Indian methods of growing were more sustainable, Cronin quotes a European traveler who was shocked by the apparent scattered diversity of Indian methods of planting crops, versus orderly European monoculture (Cronin 50). By not having a monoculture system, however, the Indian methods did not deplete the soil to the same degree as the Europeans. The benefits of diversity also yielded better nutrition. However, monoculture systems of agriculture are typical of capitalism, where more than the individual can eat is raised, so the crops can be sold or traded for other items. That is why the Europeans...
Their system was organic in the sense that it developed in conjunction with the land, rather than was imposed upon from the outside, like the European system. Cronin's ultimate proof of his thesis, as well as his analysis of documents, is what happened to the land after the natives were driven off their areas that they cultivated. Dust bowls and famines were the results of European agriculture, because it did not sufficiently replenish the soil with nutrients, and because over-hunting became so common.
interactions of the Europeans and the Native Americans during the days of the colonists. In addition the author looks at Natice American lifestyles and traditions that have survived the building of America and still exist today. There was one source used to complete this paper. Then and Now Students throughout the nation, study the beginning effects of the Europeans arriving on American soil and the reactions both to and of the
His analysis is therefore a direct investigation of the contact between the two cultural identities and their specific characteristics. As opposed to this, Cronon uses an indirect argumentation to demonstrate the differences between the two cultures. He starts his discussion from a critique of Thoreau's view on the origins of the American civilization. Thoreau first advocated that the American land was a virgin territory when it was in the hands
The Injustice of the Indian Removal Act 1830 Introduction The Indian Removal Act signed by Andrew Jackson in 1830 was meant to establish peace in the nation and to give the Native Americans their own territory where they could practice their own activities, traditions and culture without interference from the American government. However, the Act resulted in the forced migration of thousands of Native Americans from their traditional homelands to a region
Dances with Wolves is a movie that clearly shows the moral and political dilemmas that existed in those times and it also represents that fairly savage policy that the United States had against Indians and those that sided with the same. It also proved that skin color alone is not enough to keep people separated, as proven by Costner's character and the white woman he eventually took as his wife.
human acts occur within a network of relationships, processes, and systems that are as ecological as they are cultural. To such ?basic historical categories as gender, class, and race, environmental ?historians would add a theoretical vocabulary in which plants, animals, ?soils, climates, and other nonhuman entities become the coactors ?and codeterminants of a history not just of people ?but of the earth itself. William Cronon The connection between the history of
Narragansett warriors ambushed Captain Michael Pierce's column here in one of the greatest victories for the Native Americans in the war." (Pike, 1) The victories of the natives would also extend to the total destruction and colonial abandonment of Providence as marauding native alliances gathered the steam of righteous resistance against the Europeans. Still, the Europeans were very effective at exploiting existing tensions with historical roots between different native tribes. Accordingly, "the Pequots remained allies of
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