Essay On Native American Colonialism

The United States ascended as one of the most powerful and influential nations in our world despite being established only less than three hundred years ago. Starting with the thirteen colonies, it gradually grew under the principle of settler colonialism expanding from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Lauded for its rapid growth and massive influence in both the western and eastern hemisphere, it can be recognized that the ascension of the United States can be mainly attributed to the ongoing process of settler colonialism that gave way to chattel slavery, the foundation of the plantation economy during the early years of the nation’s existence. The United States became what it is today not only because of the hard work of the “white” Americans, but also thanks to the pain, hardship, and sacrifices that the African “black” slaves and other “colored” …show more content…
In Murder State by Brendan Lindsay, it illustrates how the portrayal of Native Americans as savages was used by European-Americans to prove themselves as a higher race in the social hierarchy and to rationalize their entitlement to the land and resources that waited from them in the west. The whites that were greatly influenced by the Manifest Destiny thought of themselves as the chosen people of God to usurp the lands in the west occupied by the “savage” and “uncivilized” Natives. White supremacy influenced by settler colonialism and racial formation made it possible for the whites to establish the belief that Natives and Mexican Americans were undeserving of the land and must be taken over by the civilized United States. It led Americans to enslave Natives in California similar to chattel slavery in the South where the Natives were considered as “disposable unfree laborers” and were traded and sold like goods by white employers or