Thoughts In My Head....

                Mykaella’s blog was very interesting. It informs you about the white men’s intention towards Native Americans. It also teaches you of what they did to the Native Americans while they were trying to assimilate them. They stole their land and also stole their names.

                Andy’s blog stated what the Native Americans went through while they were being kicked out of their land. They had to suffer through many illnesses that were new to them and claimed many lives. They were forced to live in poor land and in harsher conditions than what they were used to. It’s shocking all they had to go through.

                Yaidy’s blog captured the injustice towards the Native Americans, since they were deprived of freedom of religion. They couldn’t believe in their own religion but had to change to Christianity. They couldn’t even practice the Ghost Dance since the white men felt threatened by it.

                Carlo’s blog stated the unfairness of how Native Americans lost their lives because they didn’t want to assimilate. Many were injured, but many more lost their lives. They didn’t want to lose their culture, so they took a stand for it. Clearly, the whites didn’t like or approved of this.

Ligny’s blog was also very interesting and informative. The Native Americans were always thought of savages, even though they learned many tricks from European settlers. The government didn’t keep their word when they sent the Native Americans to reservations, so the Indians had every right to get angered.

Stolen Lands...Deprived Identities...

                The Native Americans have had to go through many hardships because of the white settlers that claimed their land as their own. They forced the Native Americans out of their land and moved them to pieces of land, called reservations, where they were barely able to survive. They were not able to be independent and some had to give up their religion, beliefs, and even their names.

                The white settlers believed that you could only own land if you had a piece of paper with your signature on it stating that it was yours, whereas the Native Americans believed in sharing their lands with their “brother tribes”.  The settlers claimed the Native Americans’ lands as their own and forced them to move to reservations in which they had to live in poor conditions. The government had agreed to give them money so they could get what was necessary for them to survive, but they didn’t keep their promise, which added to the building tension between them. The poor conditions in which they lived in resulted in many Native Americans losing their lives since they had no medical treatment, few blankets, and even less food.  

The lands on the reservations were poor for farming and they were not allowed to hunt animals outside of them.  The children attending school there had to change their native names to Christian names like Charles or John.  They had to listen to what was being taught to them in another language, English, and were not allowed to participate in class if they still had their Native American names. In a way, they had to abandon their own identities and pick new, European-American identities.

                Native Americans were not allowed to speak their own language or believe in their own religion. They were forced to turn into Christians and men had to cut their long hair since it was not acceptable for men to have long hair. They were not allowed to do the Ghost Dance because the white settlers felt threatened by it. The Native Americans were thought of as savages so they were restricted from many things and were judged constantly. They carried weapons in order to defend themselves, but they weren’t allowed many and the white settlers still had the upper hand.

                The white settlers never really approved of the Native Americans costumes or beliefs. They did everything in their power to try to assimilate them and make them less “savage”.  They were forced to leave their land, change their name, and change their religion. They had to suffer through many hardships that affected their lives in many ways.

Bibliography:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_Americans_in_the_United_States#Assimilation