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ORIGINS OF AMERICA Myth: North America was a vast, tentative unknown expanse. White Europeans tamed and civilized it FACT: not a new world but an old one.

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Presentation on theme: "ORIGINS OF AMERICA Myth: North America was a vast, tentative unknown expanse. White Europeans tamed and civilized it FACT: not a new world but an old one."— Presentation transcript:

1 ORIGINS OF AMERICA Myth: North America was a vast, tentative unknown expanse. White Europeans tamed and civilized it FACT: not a new world but an old one it was peopled; civilized; and cultured 1. had governments =democratic and matriarchal 2. laws and courts 3. cities – some more than 200,000 ( bigger than London) 4. agricultural and trade economies

2 Who were the First Americans? Asians – of Mongol stock from southwest and central Asia Migration to America began 50,0000years ago people in North America before there were Europeans! Travel possible by sea: island to island ? voyage of the KON TIKI by Thor Heyerdahl Most likely by Land Bridge @ Bering Strait Arctic Ocean may receded by up to 1500 feet It will take these “Americans” 15,000year to reach the tip of South America: Tierra de Fuego

3 Life Style at first, stone users; nomadic hunters 5,000 years ago: mix of hunting and farming 3,000 years ago: establish agriculture … These developments parallel the steady migration south. The highest developed societies were in the south: Mayan and Aztec

4 NATIVE CULTURE Environment and lifestyle lead to diversity among the tribal cultures based on custom, language, beliefs, and societal structures. At contact 1500 AD (CE) in what will be the USA: 12 languages spoken east of the Mississippi River, but 2,000 languages in the West Diversity = Isolation smaller groups can grow and survive apart vast tracts of woodland, mountains, and rivers cause further isolation NB: no beasts of burden existed in North America> Transportation was by foot, back or canoe ***** No idea of pan Indianism except for the notable exception of the Iroquois Confederacy: 5 United Nations of the Mohawk Seneca Cayuga Oneida and Onondaga people 3 Great Divisions:1. High Civilization Aztec Mayan Inca 2. Agricultural Societies Pueblo SW of USA irrigation; cash crops, “apartments” Hopi deep rooted traditions; resistance to change 3. Woodland and Plains People Algonquians: Iroquois/Huron/Shawnee Plains: Lakota/Apache/Cheyenne/Crow Independent and Autonomous; small groups connected by a clan system : which made them difficult to conquer- last for two centuries against modern Western men

5 Decline of Native Populations 1500 AD (CE) = 120 million in entire Western Hemisphere only 10 million North of the Rio Grande River: USA 1600 AD (CE) = 12 million – 90 percent decline !!!! 50 percent decline in what will be the USA 1. killed by Spanish and English armed force 2. tribal wars: Pueblos v. Apache; Iroquois v. the world!! 3. Pestilence: no immunity to small pox, flu, STDS, forced starvation in Santo Domingo killed 1 million in 20 yrs (1620-1640) 4. Natural dip in population coupled with European contact = disaster by 1850: only 250,00 natives left in Western Hemisphere 1970: 900,000 native Americans in USA 2010: 3.4 million claim native ethnicity


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