How Did African Americans Influence European Imperialism

Europeans throughout history are known to believe that God wanted them to educate the world based on their beliefs. This was most apparent during European exploration and imperialism. This was not necessarily what the indigenous people thought though. Europeans influence had a great impact in different nations and was viewed differently too, whether it was cooperation from African tribes for slave trade to resistance from the Chinese government to legalize the trade of opium to a mix of both responses from Native American tribes. Many African tribe leaders cooperated with Europeans in the Atlantic Slave Trade. Since Europeans were not able to successfully enter mainland Africa they relied on coastal tribes to provide them with slaves. The

The Chinese had already known about the existence of opium, but did not start smoking it until the habit of snaking tobacco in the Americas spread to China creating addictions that fueled the opium trade and infiltrated imperial troops (www.britannica.com). The current Chinese ruler at the time did try to restrained and limit the trade of the drug, but since the balance of trade for Europe, especially England, had shifted dramatically in their favor (since they became a great fan of silk, porcelain, and tea from China) they were not about to lose their valuable opium trade business (www.britannica.com ). England could not help, but engage in two opium wars with China (the former coming out as victor in both wars), the first led to a pause in prohibiting the drug and the second extinguished the idea of possibly banning it altogether because of that it took many years to pass before India and China came to an agreement to try to stop the sell of opium and even more for people's addictions to disappear (www.britannica.com ). Unfortunately, for China this caused a decline in the economy since the balance shifted from China exporting more than importing to the other way around, it also affected many of the Chinese inhabitants since many of them grew addicted to opium and like any other drug, it took its toll on the person and China's population. Europe, on the other

Many of them were opposed to the Europeans coming in and claiming their land as theirs, whereas many of them wanted to create trading partners or even went as far as to believe they were gods. When the Spaniards first arrived at what was most likely Tulum on the Yucatan peninsula they were greet by many indigenous people with gifts for them, gifts of gold which made the Spaniards practically jump for joy at the thought of wealth and recognition (Stuart 117). This is how many of the explorers were met when they first arrived in the New World, but after the natives realized their true intentions they would most likely end up going to war. There was an Aztec woman of approximately 17 years of age who served as an interpreter between the Aztecs and the Spaniards, her name was Malinalli/ Doña Marina, but is more commonly known as La Malinche in Mexico, she ended marrying Hernan Cortés and had the first known mestizo, Martín Cortés (Pohl and Robinson 99). This shows that there were many people who wanted to interact more with the Spaniards and it also left a lasting impact because to this day many people view her as a traitor to her own people, but there is still argument that she was the first of many to have a mestizo which most of the Mexican population is nowadays. As many people know from a young age, the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag tribe were able to strike up a