Colonial Expedition's Effect On The Indigenous People

Colonial Era During colonial times, people went out to explore and conquer new land. In history we often only get to see one side of the story, and do not get a chance to see the bad side of things. For example, many people view Christopher Columbus as a great hero who discovered the Americas and showed the native people new things. In reality Columbus's expedition hurt the indigenous people more than helped. Once the explorers got to the new land they saw it as an economic potential, a way to make money off the native people. This would be an easy task at first because of the technological advances and the superiority of these new people. The Europeans would use the natives as slaves to perform a variety of tasks. For example, they would be sold and traded to help build
He then used them to mine gold and others resources for economic gain. People saw him doing this and wanted in, so more and more Europeans began using natives as slaves to get rich. “....slavery developed quickly into a regular institution, into the normal labor relation of blacks to whites in the New World. With it developed that special racial feeling—whether hatred, or contempt, or pity, or patronization—that accompanied the inferior position of blacks in America for the next 350 years —that combination of inferior status and derogatory thought we call racism.” (Zinn 24). As the growing need in North America for labor became evident, the first enslaved Africans were brought to Jamestown, VA in 1619. They began bringing African slaves over and using them for forced labor. The progression of the slave trade increased gradually and by 1800, some estimates had 50 million Africans seized or killed by the European slave trade. Many of these same estimates calculate that only about 10 million Africans survived the horrors of the Middle Passage to the New World. Not only did Christopher Columbus essentially begin the use of slaves in the Americas, he brought disease. The deadliest of