--
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>From: Keith Hudson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
> I don't disagree with most of what you have written below. But the matter
> of the effects of direct confrontation between invaders and indigenous
> people is really only confusing the issue. The real influence is that of
> trade and the availability of new goods.
Thomas:
This is a very good point. But there is a deeper level which the new
invaders, traders could not reach. The Native North Americans had developed
a psychology, as we would term it today, that was totally foreign and in
most cases, beyond the comprehension of the crude Europeans who came from
wars, hierarchies of political organization and primarily greed motivation.
One of the sad aspects of colonization, to me, was that those who were
pursueing the agendas of materialistic trade, aggression and conquest were
unable to see and learn from the political, social, pychological and
spiritual resources the First Nations people had developed in the isolation
imposed by the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
Imagine how different the colonization period could have been if the
alchemists, the practioners of witchcraft and paganism could have been
included among the first explorers instead of soldiers and merchants.
Later, when learned men like Ben Franklin and others who finally developed
an appreciation of the concepts of democracy that the Six Nation
Confederation had developed, they were able to incorporate some of these
political innovations into their concept of democratic government.
It is mostly assumed thae European culture brought civilization to the
Natives. In fact, I could make the argument that the Europeans killed
civilization by their focus on trade. It is not trade that makes for
civility and justice. It is the worldview of peoples that create the
systems they live under. The natives world view allowed them to develop
certain forms of political, territorial organizations that were in many
respects superior to the European model, especially in those years of
exploration and conquest from 1600 to 1800.
Kieth says:
This is the moment when customs
> start to change. This moment is when goods actually cross into the market
> places of indigenous peoples and can often be years (or decades) before
> they ever meet new settlers or are directly affected by them. (Steel blades
> made in Birmingham and Sheffield reached the tribes of central New Guinea
> more than a century before these tribes were "discovered" by white man.)
> Earlier still, look at the speed at which the atlatl (and, later, its
> development as the bow-and-arrow) was accepted by the *whole* of mankind as
> it was then (circa 15,000BC) -- because it instantly raised hunting
> productivity many many times over. This totally transformed the customs and
> social structures of pre-atlatl hunter-gatherers. Probably, only a trace
> of their oral history survived the transition. Would we really want to
> preserve their customs, too? (The atlatl and the bow-and-arrow wiped out
> most of the big game species that were alive then. Before that time, many
> of their customs and folklore would have included these animals in their
> pantheon. How could their pre-bow-and-arrow customs have continued in a
> realistic way when the objects of their veneration had become extinct?)
Thomas:
You bring some history into my awareness that I had not contemplated before.
Let me rebut some of your conclusions with the understanding of hunter
gatherer's. As they lived off the animal population and in much closer
relationship to the natural cycles of animal population availability, they
were also at effect of periods of surplus and lack. This led them to an
ecological understanding that Europeans did not have. The bow, and later
the horse allowed them to increase their ability to harvest food from the
environment, it did not change the basic dynamics of balance. For if they
overhunted, the result was starvation. It is my contention that their
errors such as you have mentioned in the extinction of large species, that
the Natives developed a relationship with their food supply that was very
different than the Europeans relationship with their food supply which was a
product of agriculture and domestic animals rather than wildlife. Where
Europeans farmed a small portion, one could make the statement the Natives
"farmed" the whole continent in a much more sustainable fashion and that the
political organizations that developed from that model may very well prove
to be more concductive to human survival than the European model. The story
is not over yet.
>
Keith said:
> You say you respect the culture of North American Indians. This implies
> that I don't respect them. Of course I do. All I am saying is that large
> chunks of their culture (such as languages) have disappeared because
> they're irrelevant in modern-day practice and that no amount of artificial
> encouragement (unless it be for the tourist trade) will save it. New
> customs will arise in due course, and those will be respected, too.
Thomas:
Sad but true, in many cases. However there is hope. We recently divided
the NorthWest Territories to create Nanoviuk (Sp) which is the first
Province in the World, to my knowledge, which creates a political and
physical state based on the ethnicity of First Nations people, probably
because the North is too harsh for the whiteman. With Inuit and Natives in
charge finally of their political destiny, we may see an adaption of their
orginal understandings and the modern world create something very different
that any of us could project. (PS) Though it took a hundred years, I would
ask you to note that it was done peaceably.
Respectfully,
Thomas Lunde
>
> Keith
>
>
>
>
>
> At 09:27 25/07/99 +0000, you wrote:
>>
>>
>>----------
>>>From: Keith Hudson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>>
>>
>>
>>> I'm not so sure about all this. I used to think the same as Ed. I think,
>>> now, that this point of view romanticises our ancestors. I rather think
>>> that if their society had been as natural/stable/satisfying as is often
>>> implied then it would have been a great deal more robust when faced with
>>> modern society.
>>
>>Thomas:
>>
>>It is not that their society was not robust. It was, in my opinion, that
>>disease knocked the robustness out of their society. I think we often skim
>>over the effects of what might happen to a culture when %30 - %90 die.
>>There was no way to fight the disease's of white culture - they mysteriously
>>came, decimated families, tribal groups, specialized skills and left the
>>remainder in a state of shock and forced to survive at the most primitive
>>level.
>>
>>At the same time, a culture that valued land through ownership,
>>disenfranchised their tradional ways, isolated them to reservations, made
>>promise they did not keep and exploited them shamelessly.
>>
>>And finally, there was gunpowder.
>>
>>Keith wrote:
>>
>>True, in many places, indigenous society and modern
>>> settlers both needed the same land and couldn't possibly co-exist, but in
>>> many other places the original culture could have survived more or less
>>> intact if they'd wanted it to. Instead, when faced with all the gewgaws
>>> and temptations (including strong liquor) that modern man had to offer,
>>> then most indigenous societies folded up quite quickly -- voluntarily, as
>>> it were.
>>
>>Thomas:
>>
>>I find this most patronizing. Settlers did not "need" the land, they wanted
>>the land to create wealth. The Indians, in many cases were willing to share
>>but the white man wanted exclusive ownership. As to their susceptability
>>to temptations, look in our own back yard at alcholism, drug abuse - not
>>only among the poor, but among our professional classes as well, cocaine is
>>not a poor man's drug.
>>
>>As to folding up, as you put it, I would choose to say overwhelmed by sheer
>>numbers. Just as parts of England have been overwhelmed by immigration from
>>previous colonial peoples.
>>
>>What I would say is that they often survived despite these crippling
>>situations and in many cases have competed with us and succeeded. The
>>culture of the Native North American Indians is growing, adapting, changing
>>the ways of European immigrants today. I respect them immensely.
>>
>>Respectfully,
>>
>>Thomas Lunde
>>
>>> ________________________________________________________________________
>>>
>>> Keith Hudson, General Editor, Handlo Music, http://www.handlo.com
>>> 6 Upper Camden Place, Bath BA1 5HX, England
>>> Tel: +44 1225 312622; Fax: +44 1225 447727; mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>>> ________________________________________________________________________
>>>
>>
>>
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Keith Hudson, General Editor, Handlo Music, http://www.handlo.com
> 6 Upper Camden Place, Bath BA1 5HX, England
> Tel: +44 1225 312622; Fax: +44 1225 447727; mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
