Change Over Time the Continual Revolution...

Abstract: This paper will show how between the time of Jamestown to the beginning of the American Revolution, the Native Americans were in a constant state of cultural revolution, specifically pressured on their self suficientness, identity, and politics. Support from http://www.pilgrimhall.org/, http://www.historypoint.org/, and specific support comes from "The Earth Shall Weep" by James Willson.

Contact between Native Americans and Europeans between the founding of Jamestown in 1607 and the outbreak of the American Revolution in 1776, constituted a continuous revolution for the Native Americans. The Native Americans changed from a self sufficient people, dependant only on themselves, to needing European supplies. The Native American identity was altered completely from personal and independent to collective, and their politics, originally used to show status, changed to survival.

Before the Europeans arrived in America, the Indians were self sufficient and did not live in hardly any way like the Europeans. The Indians lacked many of the technological advances of the Europeans. While the Europeans were making advancements and heading toward industrialization, the Indians were living off the land through hunting, gathering of food, some through small means of farming. They had self made clothing, weapons, simpler tools and many religions all differing greatly from Christianity. To the Europeans the Indian way of life was backward; however the Indians lack of progress did not hinder them from getting along in their part of the world. When the Europeans arrived in The New World they brought with them technology that was totally new and different to the Native Americans. Not only did they bring things like guns, larger scale farming methods, and other tools, but they also set up trading posts. The trading posts helped introduce European good farther than just close range to the colonies, because traders would often swap their European goods for furs to send back across the ocean. Some Indians did not involve themselves with the goods and many did. In some circumstances, such as when violence brakes out between the two sides and one has muskets while the other only bows, Indians could hardly do without the European technology. The longer the Europeans were in America and the more the Indians interacted and traded with them, the more dependent the Indians became on the European goods. Some Europeans used this to their advantage. James Willson says:

"Metal tools and weapons did not simply alter the lives of the tribe who acquired them: They also affected enemies and neighbors, who suddenly found themselves at an enormous disadvantage and were forced to seek their own sources of European goods in order to feed and defend their people."

Willson also quotes a Hudson Bay worker in his book The Earth Shall Weep as saying:

"I have made it my study to examine the nature and character of Indians and however repugnant it may be to our feelings, I am convinced they must be ruled with a rod of Iron to bring and keep them in a proper state of subordination, and the most certain way to effect this is by letting them feel their dependence upon us... In the woods and northern barren grounds this measure ought to be pursued rigidly next year if they do not improve, and no credit, not so much as a load of ammunition, given them until they exhibit an inclination to renew their habits of industry. In the plains, however, this system will not do, as they can live independent of us, and by withholding ammunition, tobacco and spirits, the Staple articles of Trade, for one year, they will recover the use of their Bows and spears, and lose sight of their smoking and drinking habits; it will therefore be necessary to bring those Tribes round by mild and cautious measure..."

More and more Indians slowly became dependant on European goods. Not only did the dependence cause them to need the Europeans, but it also caused them to behave more like the Europeans in some ways because of the use of the European tools and goods.

The Europeans saw the different Native American tribes as all being simply Indians. The Native Americans originally however, identified themselves very differently. The Native Americans did not view all their tribes as being one big group as the Europeans did; but this perception changed over time. Before the Europeans were inhabiting America, the various Indian tribes were distinctly separate and independent. That is not to say that there was no contact or interaction at all between tribes, but that they were different from each other and they were certainly not dependant on each other in anyway. Their cultures were similar but each tribe was distinctly its own separate independent people. As the Europeans began to stifle Indian culture and drop understanding and fairness Indians fight back. The Powhatans rose against the English people of Jamestown because of their unfairness; but the English quickly put them down. Eventually the Indians realized that in order to stand a chance against the Europeans the tribes would have to join together. When the Puritans in Massachusetts had become too cruel and forceful toward the surrounding Indians, many Indian tribes joined together and fought against the English in the first Pan-Indian War; King Philips War; bringing them together. Slowly, though the Native Americans still had separate tribes, they began to think of themselves as together and all Indians.

When the Europeans first settled in America the Indians wanted to show them that they were still the dominant power, and to do this they used a custom of their culture. The Indians brought gifts to the Europeans to show that they were powerful. The Europeans did not understand the intent of the gifts at all. many Europeans thought that the Indians gave them gifts not for any serious reason but because they were not as intelligent. Wilson explains, "Their 'generosity' was not naivete, as many Europeans thought, but neither was it cynical opportunism." When the Indians realized that the Europeans were taking advantage of the gifts and not seeing them as a sign of the Indians power, politics began to go down hill. As the European treatment of the Native Americans worsened, the Indians rose up against it with violence. The Indians were either quickly beaten back or hasty treaties were made up. Carl Clausewitz said "War is a continuation of politics by other means," and this was true for the Indians. When the treaties fell through, and the treatment was clearly not going to improve, the Indians banned together and made war on the Europeans. This had a affect on the Europeans be did little to change the way they regarded the Indians. Eventually the Indians realized that they could not stop the Europeans from coming or send them back, and that things were not going to get better for them or go back to the way that it was before the Europeans came. So, the Indians changed their tactics of survival again. As the French and English fought each other, the Indians took sides to their best overall advantage; fighting along side Europeans.

Though European contact caused constant revolution for the Native American culture, in making the Indians dependant on the European goods, changing their identity, and their waring politics, some things in the native American culture could not be changed. native Americans have always had a strong attachment to certain places connected to their religion, and even now Native American peoples who are moved from their places do not hold up well, and often have problems with alcoholism, drugs, or depression. Some make pilgrimages to their sacred places like the journey the descendants of Wounded Knee made. Many Native Americans still use their old organic forms of medicines, while others preform traditional dances, and almost all carry on the Native American oral traditions. Even though European culture revolutionized the Native American culture it could not wipe it out.