Unbeknownst to me, there has been some controversy in regards to natives and their “citizenship”, if you will. Before this course, I never really thought about where the natives came from. I just knew they were here first, therefore, making it their land. It was once I read Treuer’s introduction in Atlas of Indian Nations that I really became interested in their origin.
It’s believed they traveled from Asia over the Bering Strait. This has led people to say that this makes Indians immigrants. Like Treuer states, “…the fact of the matter is that Indians arrived in the America and developed a diverse array of cultures and languages, inhabiting the entire hemisphere before there were any humans living in what is now England (the British Isles were entirely encased in ice until 12,000 years ago) and many thousands of years before the emergence of ancient Chinse, Egyptian, or Phoenician civilizations” (Treuer,9.) In Treuer’s Everything You Wanted to Know About Indians but Were Afraid to Ask, he states through research there has been many archeological sites found with evidence of human existence in North America ranging back as far as 50,000 years ago (Treuer, 17).
The issue remains with scientists coming to a consentience. An article posted on Time.com last summer, stated scientist have now found new evidence that human arrived around 15,000 years ago and then split into smaller tribes (Basu).
Whenever it was they did arrive in the Americas holds little weight on the issue of natives being indigenous. They were the first people in the Americas making them indigenous to the land and not immigrants.
Basu, Tanya. "There's A new Theory About Native Americans' Origins." Time. 21 July 2015. http://time.com/3964634/native-american-origin-theory/
Treuer, Anton. Atlas of Indian Nations. 10-11. New York: Penguin Group. 1999.
Treuer, Anton. Everything You Wanted to Know About Indians but Were Afraid to Ask. 16-17. Minnesota: Borealis Books. 2012.
Hi Ashley, I read the Time article and am always fascinated to read what can now be discovered using DNA and the study of bones. Interesting viewpoint of Native Americans as being immigrants, that certainly makes sense. They came here from somewhere and we are just now learning where that "somewhere" was.
ReplyDeleteHi Ashley, its interesting to me to consider the depth of cultural and community wisdom, shaped by this land, which developed in a people living here longer than any 'civilization' in England or most of Europe. I often wish the Europeans who came here had been able to see the level of sophistication and intelligence the First Nations have, to adopt these ways, and to spread them across Europe instead of almost extinguishing the beauty and brilliance with their stupidity.
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