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Effects of colonization for indigenous people
Impacts of colonization of indigenous
The impact of colonization on Indigenous people
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The Role of Disease in European Exploration and Colonization
Human mobility, in terms of European transcontinental exploration and colonization, began to truly flourish after the 1400s. This travel, inspired by financial motives and justified by religious goals, resulted in the European dominance and decimation of countless cultures in both the Americas and Eurasia. While at first glance it seems as though this dominance was achieved through mainly military means - European militias, like Spanish conquistadors, rolling over native tribes with their technologically advanced weapons - the reality is significantly more complex. The Europeans, most likely unknowingly, employed another, equally deadly weapon during their exploits. With their travel, they brought with them the infectious diseases of their homelands, exposing the defenseless natives to foreign malady that their bodies had no hope of developing immunities against. Because of the nature of disease and their limited knowledge about its modes of infection, the Europeans were able to dispense highly contagious and mortal illnesses while limiting their contraction of any native ones to the new territories. In short, they were able to kill without being killed. In this way, the travel of disease in conjunction with the travel of humans in a search for exotic commodities was able to limit or even halt the development of some cultures while allowing others to flourish at exponential rates.
Before discussing how disease has shaped history and altered cultures, it is important to understand how they themselves have developed and changed throughout history. Disease, in the broadest definition of the word, has been present since the beginning of humanity. Even ...
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...hat have prevented many outbreaks. Beginning in the 1300s with the Black Death, decrees prevented travel in hopes of containing the disease. Later, after the age of exploration, quarantine again was implemented to limit the spread of new diseases. And as Cippola notes, it is probably the limited travel restricted to the coastlines that prevented the contraction of many of these New World diseases in the first place. Nonetheless, travel, be it limiting it within countries or encouraging it in new lands, has influenced the spread of cultures and simultaneously the spread of disease
Sources Cited:
Cipolla, Carlo M. Guns, sails and empires; technological innovation and the early phases of European expansion, 1400-1700. Manhattan, Kan. : Sunflower University Press, 1985.
Ponting, Clive. Ch.11 from "A Green History of the World," St. Martins Press, NYC, 1991
5. Rediker, Marcus. 2004. Villains of all nations: Atlantic pirates in the golden age. London [u.a.]: Verso.
Throughout the film there are parts of historical piracy that are shown. In the start of the film, pirate Hector Barbossa is shown as a new privateer for the English. It is revealed that Captain Barbossa is not sailing the seas for the King, but instead
The Columbian exchange was the widespread transfer of various products such as animals, plants, and culture between the Americas and Europe. Though most likely unintentional, the byproduct that had the largest impact from this exchange between the old and new world was communicable diseases. Europeans and other immigrants brought a host of diseases with them to America, which killed as much as ninety percent of the native population. Epidemics ravaged both native and nonnative populations of the new world destroying civilizations. The source of these epidemics were due to low resistance, poor sanitation, and inadequate medical knowledge- “more die of the practitioner than of the natural course of the disease (Duffy).” These diseases of the new world posed a serious
William H. McNeill makes a monumental contribution to the knowledge of humanity in his book Plagues and Peoples. He looks at the history of the world from an ecological point of view. From this viewpoint the history of human civilization is greatly impacted by changing patterns of epidemic infection. Plagues and Peoples suggests that "the time scale of world history...should [be] viewed [through] the "domestication" of epidemic disease that occurred between 1300 and 1700" (page 232). "Domestication" is perceived "as a fundamental breakthrough, directly resulting from the two great transportation revolutions of that age - one by land, initiated by the Mongols, and one by sea, initiated by Europeans" (page 232). This book illustrates how man's environment and its resident diseases have controlled human migration, as well as societal successes and failures. McNeill discusses the political, demographical, and psychological effects of disease on the human race. He informs his audience that epidemics are still a viable threat to society, and warns of potential future consequences.
The introduction of Old World diseases was a substantial catalyst in the building of American colonial societies. Diseases such as smallpox devastated the native people’s populations. According to one estimate, within the span of the 16th century, the native population of central Mexico was reduced to about 700,000 from at least 13 million. (The Earth and Its Peoples, 475) Other regions were similarly affected by the disease and others such as measles, typhus, influenza, and malaria. These diseases, in effect, cleared the way for European settlers, although, in a somewhat gruesome fashion.
While the Europeans were traveling to the New World, they often brought domesticated animals with them for sources of food and livestock. When animals and humans are living in close quarters together, it is very likely for exposure to germs to occur. New diseases were brought over by foreigners looking for fame and gold that killed off many of the natives in the new lands. The natives did not stand a chance against these new threats because of a lack of knowledge and supplies to cure themselves. Once the Europeans established diseases as they made land in the New World, their journey had only become easier as their competition were being wiped out from the rapid spread.
Crosby, Alfred W. Ecological Imperialism The Biological Expansion of Europe 900-1900. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1986.
In his text, Rediker follows the evolution of the merchant seaman, from a wage laborer looking for work, to an employee of a brutal and often times unfair labor system, to a pirate, striking out against the establishment that hired him, in an effort to gain fair compensation for work performed. In the seafaring world of the 17th and 18th centuries, many changes were taking place in the economy. The form of labor changed from a share system to a wage system. Trade shifted from luxury goods to bulk goods, such as tobacco and sugar. (Rediker 112) And the scope and authority of the trading community widened and organized itself into a well oiled profit based international business. In all of these changes, the merchant seaman was a cog, caught
Tatar, Maria. Off with Their Heads!: Fairy Tales and the Culture of Childhood. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1992. Print.
Europeans were deemed poor candidates for slavery due to their higher mortality rates. In 17th century, the New World was going through Public Health crisis. European immigration to the New World influenced the transmission of unknown epidemic diseases in American colonies. Warm climate in American colonies also became det...
During the 19th century, Grimm’s fairytales were strongly disapproved of due to harsh, gruesome details and plots. One American educator from 1885 stated, “The folktales mirror all too loyally the entire medieval worldview and culture with all its stark prejudice, its crudeness and barbarities.” As childre...
Although populations in ancient societies suffered attacks, invasions, starvation, and persecution, there was a more efficient killer that exterminated countless people. The most dreaded killers in the ancient world were disease, infections and epidemics. In many major wars the main peril was not gunfire, nor assault, but the easily communicable diseases that rapidly wiped out whole divisions of closely quartered soldiers. Until the time of Hippocrates, in the struggle between life and death, it was, more often than not, death that prevailed when a malady was involved. In the modern world, although illness is still a concern, advances in thought and technique have led to the highest birth rates in recorded history. No longer is a fever a cause for distress; a quick trip to the store and a few days of rest is the current cure. An infection considered easily treatable today could have meant disablement, even death to an ancient Greek citizen.
Rediker, Marcus. Villains of All Nations: Atlantic Pirates in the Golden Age. Boston: Beacon Press, 2004.
Globalization, a great number of people regard it as a chiefly economic phenomenon, necessitating the additional integration, or interaction, of nationally based economic entities through the development of international trade, investment and monetary flows. Also included in this view is the rapid advances in sharing social and cultural values as well as new technologies as the world grows together. Globalization can be defined as a procedure in which geographic distance is a diminishing factor in the formation and sustentation of international economic, political and cultural relations. Proponents of this process believe that free trade and integration of world markets will facilitate growth in economies both old and new. Proponents also believe that globalization will stimulate the spread of democracy and in turn improve the condition of human rights so intrinsic to the values of democracy. Critics of globalization see globalization quite differently, portraying it as worldwide push toward a globalized economic system under the control of global corporate trade and banking institutions that are not responsible to the democratic system or governments. Many questions surround globalization. What are the costs and benefits of free trade? Does globalization exacerbate global inequality? What impact does globalization have on the environment? Are industries in developed nations being weakened by industries in developing or third world countries that have a lower standard and therefore cost of labor?
Rice, Eugene E. and Anthony Grafton. The Foundations of Early Modern Europe, 1460-1559. 2nd. ed. New York: W. W. Norton and Co., 1994.