Native Americans Before Christopher Columbus Discovered the Essay

Native Americans

Before Christopher Columbus discovered the United States of America, and people from all over the globe including Europe, Asia and Africa migrate to inhabit the New World, it was already home to a group of people. This group of people is known as Native Americans or American Indians. These Native Americans lived as hunter-gatherer societies, with tribes living on pieces of lands as a community, using them for agriculture. The migration of Europeans into the New World changed the cultural dynamics of the land. There were arrays of differences between the European and Native American cultures were subsequently led to immense political tension as a result of ongoing contradictions between the two groups along with shifting of alliances of different nations between the two. The increase in the European expansion in America led to a rise in the tension between the groups. In 1830, the Indian Removal Act was passed by the U.S. Congress that relocated the Native Americans from their homelands to states established on the west of the Mississippi River. This relocation was to accommodate the growing European-American population. This led to a great deal of resistance from the Native Americans with a series of uprisings, those including the American Civil war and the subsequent Indian Wars that were fought up to 1890's before the U.S. government forced them to abandon in exchange for a number of treaties signed and land recessions given. In 1924, the Congress granted to all Native Americans.However, the ever-growing population and diversity in the United States led to the Native Americans being forgotten only too often due to their preference of staying within their community. Due to increased discrimination, inequality and federal legislation limiting the growth of the community, in late in 1960's (more specifically 1968), The American Indian Movement (AIM) was born. The manifesto of the movement was education, economic independence and renewal of American Indian traditions. The major causes for the Movement were the living conditions that the Native Americans were thrown in a bad light over the past few decades and were victims of much injustice at the hands of the white immigrants. They had succumbed to such harsh living conditions at the hand of immigrants in their own homeland. This referred to the slum housing conditions, high levels of unemployment, and racist treatment received by the American Indians. The movement challenged the rights of the American Indians under various treaties, and strived for not only the elimination of discrimination and racism but also the reclamation of the tribal lands that were taken away from them when they were relocated as a result of the Indian Removal Act of 1830. The AIM was set up by Clyde Bellecourt, Dennis Banks and many others.

The activities of the American Indian Movement (AIM) were revolutionary (Steindorf, 2001). The movement sought to reclaim the position that American Indians had in the society and restore their civil rights to the same caliber.....