How did the conflict between Native Americans and European Americans start?
The first Americans came from Asia. They walked across the Bering Strait thousands of years ago, when the strait was still land. They were hunters. They were in lots of different groups, called tribes. The most famous tribes were the Sioux, the Apache, the Cherokees, the Navajos, the Black Foot and the Cheyenne. There were about 150 tribes, and each tribe spoke a different language.
When the first Europeans arrived, the Native Americans helped them. At the first Thanksgiving meal, the Pilgrim Fathers celebrated with the Native Americans. As more Europeans arrived, there was a fight for land.
The new Europeans WANTED MORE LAND AND THEY TOOK IT BY FORCE FROM THE NATIVE AMERICAN TRIBES. The Europeans didn't like the CULTURE AND TRADITIONS of Native Americans and they tried to DESTROY THEIR WAY OF LIFE.
AMERICAN INDIAN WARS
1876: THE BATTLE OF LITTLE BIGHORN (Montana)
AT THE BATTLE OF LITTLE BIGHORN, 2000 SIOUX AND CHEYENNE WARRIORS AND THEIR CHIEF, SITTING BULL, KILLED GENERAL CUSTER AND AROUND 230 OF HIS SOLDIERS.
(4 minutes)
LET'S GO BACK TO THE BUFFALOES SKULLS.......
WHY SO MANY SKULLS?
In a previous paragraph we have read: "The Europeans didn't like the CULTURE AND TRADITIONS of Native Americans and they tried to DESTROY THEIR WAY OF LIFE". To destroy the buffalo meant to destroy their way of life....their existance! Because their life was centered around the buffalo's migrations. The construction of the railroad led to the near-extinction of the buffalo, which had sustained native populations for centuries.
THE HEART AND SOUL OF THE LAKOTA:
THE BUFFALO
At the core of the Lakota culture is the buffalo or Tatanka. For thousands of years, the lives of the Buffalo Nation and the Lakota people were spiritually and physically interconnected. The Indians had a symbiotic relationship with them, and always honored the mighty beasts for the many blessings they provided.
As the buffalo roamed the Plains, so did the Lakota. The entire existence of the people centered around the buffalo’s epic migration across the vast plains of North America – from Canada to Mexico; the Pacific Northwest to the Appalachian Mountains.
The buffalo is brave – they were practically invincible and afraid of nothing – and the fearless native warriors reflected these courageous traits in battle.
To the Lakota, these magnificent animals sustained all life. The Lakota regarded the buffalo as a gift of the Great Spirit and viewed them as a relative. Whenever one was killed, its sacrifice was honored.
The buffalo meant everything…they provided them their shelter, their food, their weapons, their toys. The buffalo was a connection to the Creator. The buffalo provided for the people spiritually, culturally, and socially. The buffalo gave the people life.
60 million bison roamed North America at the turn of the 19th century, though Native Americans had hunted them for millennia. Then, Europeans arrived in the west. By 1910, only 5000 bison survived!!!
THE HEART AND SOUL OF THE LAKOTA:
THE BLACK HILLS
The"Black Hills" are so-called because they are covered with trees.
Native Americans have a long history in the Black Hills. The Black Hills are a mysterious, holy place for the Lakota tribe.
After George Armstrong Custer’s Black Hills Expedition, European Americans discovered GOLD there in 1874.
So, the US government re-assigned the Lakota, against their wishes, to other reservations in western South Dakota.
Now, have a look at these photographs:
WHAT IS IT?
WHERE IS IT?
Between 1927 and 1941, 400 workers sculpted the colossal carvings of U. S. Presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln to represent the first 150 years of American history.
Mount Rushmore is controversial among Native Americans because the United States seized the area from the Lakota tribe after the Great Sioux War of 1876–77.
WHAT IS IT?
WHERE IS IT?
The Crazy Horse Memorial is a mountain monument that is currently under construction in the Black Hills of South Dakota.
It wants to commemorate a famous Native American leader, Crazy Horse, a Lakota warrior, riding a horse and pointing into the distance.
The monument is also a response to Mount Rushmore.
- Nel 1845 il Governo degli Stati Uniti fece pressione su Capo Seattle e la sua tribù di nativi americani allo scopo di acquistare alcuni territori dove loro vivevano e cacciavano: due milioni di acri e uno stile di vita in cambio di 150 mila dollari e di una riserva entro la quale il Governo degli Stati Uniti si impegnava a mantenere la tribù. Capo Seattle rispose con un discorso che dipinge con graffiante efficacia la società urbana degli Stati Uniti nel 1850 e delineava un pauroso ritratto del mondo come lo vediamo oggi. La sua risposta costituisce una delle più Alte espressioni di consapevolezza ambientale mai fatte dall'uomo.
Ecco un estratto da CHIEF SEATTLE'S THOUGHTS, 1854.
"So we will consider your offer to buy our land. If we decide to accept, I will make one condition - the white man must treat the beasts of this land as his brothers. I am a savage and do not understand any other way. I have seen a thousand rotting buffaloes on the prairie, left by the white man who shot them from a passing train. I am a savage and do not understand how the smoking iron horse can be made more important than the buffalo that we kill only to stay alive. What is man without the beasts? If all the beasts were gone, man would die from a great loneliness of the spirit. For whatever happens to the beasts, soon happens to man. All things are connected."
Per concludere...
"Man did not weave the web of life - he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself."
Letture consigliate:
- Guido Sgardoli, Muso Rosso, Il Sogno Americano di un Indiano Lakota, Rizzoli, 2014.
- Guido Sgardoli, Piccolo capo bianco, Rizzoli, 2010.
Sara Romoli, Scuola Secondaria di I Grado, Sarnico
Credits:
Created with images by Woody H1 - "Native American Holy Land" • kiszka king - "black_hills"