History of Racism and Slavery in America - Assignment Example

?The History of Racism and Slavery in America The Native Americans were mostly composed of tribes that hunted for their food. As a result of this,they rarely kept any animals as a part of livestock. Consequently, their history shows very few instances of a plague or any such disease that is contracted mainly through contact with livestock. The arrival of the Europeans, who followed a different lifestyle and kept animals, caused epidemics among the native Americans because they were not immune to the diseases that the Europeans were to, as a result of natural selection, that had already wiped out many of them in previous ages. 2. A response to the given statement should seek to make the speaker understand how the views expressed by him are a result of the colonialist discourse that not only wiped out thousands of Native Americans, but also seeks to erase any memory of them. History, as they say, is written by the victorious. This is an example of an attempt to remove the subaltern from books of history. 3. A significant difference in the way Native Americans perceived the world from the Europeans was in the way gender roles was organized. They followed a matrilineal system of inheritance. This meant that women were the ones who held property. This would mean that a much greater respect was accorded to women. This is a significant difference from the Europeans who settled in America and denied property rights to women and treated them as inferior to men. 4. Slavery in Africa was carried out by the indigenous tribes of the place who belonged to the same race. Slavery existed as a part of the social fabric that placed the peasants and the slaves together, with the peasants on a higher plane than the slaves. This later was a factor in the export of slaves from Africa. Slavery in the Americas, however, was carried out by people of different races. The introduction of chattel slavery led to slaves being from only non-white races such as the people of African descent or those who were native to the Americas and had escaped the ethnocide that was undertaken by the Europeans. Slavery was a new phenomenon in the Americas and was not a part of its social fabric. 5. A lot of the English people who migrated to North America were not aristocrats. These people went to North America in search of adventures and for opportunities to enhance their standard of living. A group of aristocrats were also part of the group of migrants who landed in America, for the purpose of administration of the new colony. Another reason why the English people migrated to North America was the most obvious and probably the most important reason-the search for new land and resources to augment the development of England. 6. The primary reason why England wanted to establish colonies was to procure more resources from another continent that would enable a greater standard of living for its own population. Apart from this, it was also easy for the British to get a lot of indigenous products that belonged to the native tribes by cheating them or through extortion. Trade, thus was another important reason for England to establish colonies in North America. Another reason for England to establish colonies in North America was the political situation at the time when England was engaged in a great rivalry with the French and wanted to compete with them in their trade with the Native Americans. 7. An Indentured servant is a laborer who works without any wages and is provided food, clothing, shelter and transportation. The initial immigrants of North America found it very difficult to procure servants to work in the fields because of the high wages that had to be paid. Indentured servants helped solve this problem and formed a part of the society that helped build the colonies in North America. Later, they formed an important part of the population of these countries as they did not leave them for their homelands. 8. A similarity between the colonies in Africa and the colonies in North America was the fact that in both of these places, the colonizers settled down and made the colonies their home. They are different since the mass ethnocide that was practiced in North America did not happen in most parts of Africa (with exceptions like Congo). 9. The Puritans left England since the establishment of the Anglican Church and their inability to bring about reforms in that church had prevented them from being what they was the true idea of a Christian. They were of the idea that they would be able to go to America and practice a purer form of Christianity so as to provide a model for the rest of the world to emulate. 10. The soil of the Southern states was much more fertile and suitable for the production of cotton. This led to the development of plantations in the Southern states whereas the Northern states started developing into industrial centers. Slavery developed in a great way in the Southern states owing to the predominance of agriculture that was more labor-intensive than the industries in the Northern states. 11. American women gained more freedom because of the sense of wrong that was felt by the entire community of the people who had migrated to North America. The migrants consisted largely of puritans, who had realized the folly of the Salem Witch Trials and the moral debt that they owed to the community of women. This went a long way in providing women with the freedom that they needed to pursue their own interests. That Americans take the Salem Witch Trials as an example of the incredible cruelty of man can be seen in the various negative allusions made to it in American literature. 12. The gang system refers to a system of division of labor in plantations of mostly sugar and cotton, where the laborers were divided into groups based on their individual strengths and were made to work till the landowner felt that the job was complete. The task system, on the other hand, allowed the slaves the liberty to produce individual goods and they were allowed a greater freedom to choose the amount of hours that they would work for, unlike in the gang system, which would not let the slaves slow down and would demand constant labor. 13. The Great Awakening refers to the break from the spiritually degenerate or passive age, into the age of religious revitalization which occurred in America, as a result of the efforts of Protestant leaders who wished to involve parishioners in a greater way than was the practice till then. 14. As a result of its emphasis on the emotional aspect of the minds of the believers, the Great Awakening led to the abolition of rituals that were considered to be unnecessary encumbrances distracting the followers from the true spirit of Christianity. It also led to an awareness of the need to separate the church and the state, which was a major factor in the precipitation of the American Revolution, since it preached the importance of liberty and democracy. On the negative front, it created rifts between the church and fractured the relative unity that had existed in the age that preceded the Great Awakening. It also led to a resurgence of Calvinism that encouraged a theory that placed no importance on the free will of man. 15. The American Enlightenment was a part of a greater movement that occurred in many parts of Europe that emphasized the use of scientific reasoning to gain a better understanding of the human society and religion. It was a result of the scientific revolution that happened in the seventeenth century. 16. Why does the history of racism in America emerge in an area that was settled by European white people? The history of racism tends to emerge in a society that was settled by people who are of European descent, and white, because of the forces that operate colonialism. Economic exploitation remains the aim of these forms of racism as is seen in the greater amount of racism in the Southern states of America. Due to a loss of a way of life that was essentially luxurious and for all practical purposes unpaid for, the post-civil war American South experienced a loss of livelihood and crushing poverty. However, attitudes that had prevailed during the earlier period, with the poverty that had to be endured, as a reminder, cause the attitudes of racism to resurface. Attitudes of the supremacy of the white race, entrenched in the western consciousness through centuries of subjugating other races, resurface despite legislations that equate both the races at the same level. Conventional color codes and their significance (for instance, black is evil, white is good) that still exist also go a long way in sustaining this history of racism. Read More