Examples Of Continual Adaptation Of Native Americans

Oftentimes, change allows individuals to adapt to new environments and overcome difficult situations. Native Americans are a prime example of continual adaptation of their own culture, beliefs, and skills pre and post-contact with Europeans. For instance, before contact with other cultures, “They developed effective hunting, fishing and farming techniques . . . communities changed size and shifted locations in response to military, political and economic pressures”(Calloway, 1994, p. 2). Once Europeans made contact with Native Americans in 1492, the colonists were eager to create a “new world” with their own ideas. This new world concept required Native Americans to further adapt and assimilate into European culture and beliefs. As a result,

For example, John Eliot was a New England missionary who strived to eliminate several deficiencies in the Native American culture, which heavily included religion. In part, Eliot was able to establish many “praying towns”, but there was still a major conflict with the unconverted Native Americans that outright rejected this new religion. For instance, the primary document A dialogue between Piumbukhou and his unconverted Relatives highlights the opposition to Christianity. Oftentimes colonists would resort to persuading Native Americans about the benefits of worshiping god, but several tribes did not accept this new teaching because it threatened their well-established traditional ways of life. As Piumbukhou starts to offer new ideas from the bible about worshiping god, the kinsfolk interject by stating “Our forefathers were wise men . . . are you wiser than our fathers? . . . English men have invented these stories to amaze us and fear us out of our old customs” (Calloway, 1994, p. 48). Here, Native Americans have had thousands of years of established traditions and beliefs. They can’t just be uprooted abruptly from the surrounding pressures of colonists. Also, there is a major lack of understanding between both cultures and religions where the Native Americans state to Piumbukhou “You make long and learned discourses to us which we do not well understand

America became a world of blended culture, intertwined with the constant battle of cultural domination from the colonists. Over time, Native Americans formed a dependency on Europeans from trading, lost most of their population from disease or war that forced many tribes to seek refuge with the colonists in exchange for adopting their new cultural ideals and beliefs. As a result, the gain of new ideas among native tribes led to the loss of old traditions and ideas founded by Native American ancestors. To pursue new ideas, old ones have to be left behind. As Colonists promoted their new ideas, they had to suppress Native Americans' old ideas that are even seen today where most Native Americans' roles and experiences are only briefly mentioned in historical records. This loss of cultural and traditional beliefs from these factors forever changed Native American society, where it is left to them to dig up the dirt of the past and put the pieces back