Native American Culture Essay

Since the end of the American Civil War, Native American culture was drastically declining. When the United States government began forcing Native American tribes into Indian Reservations, they also forced white culture upon the young generation of Native Americans. In the twenty-first century, places such as Cherokee, North Carolina have been in place to continue the dying culture of Native tribes. After traveling to Cherokee, North Carolina around ten years ago, I saw the similarities and differences between American culture and Cherokee culture, and the history of how Indian Relocation affected Native Americans. Many Cherokees keep the same values as their ancestors did, and in Cherokee, you can see how these values are kept throughout

Many years before the American Civil War began, white settlement into Native Land was a growing issue. White Americans wanted the land many Natives lived on, as the land was rich with soil, and a rumor was heard that gold was found in the land. “The removal of the Cherokees was a product of the demand for arable land during the rampant growth of cotton agriculture in the Southeast, the discovery of gold, and the racial prejudice that many white southerners harbored toward American Indians” (Garrison Cherokee Removal). American Indians; including the Cherokees, were seen as savages and unable to fully adapt to American traditions and values. “In 1830, President Andrew Jackson signed the Indian Removal Act, which gave the federal government the power to exchange Native-held land east of the Mississippi for the land in the west … located in present-day Oklahoma” (Editors The Trail of Tears). As many Americans know, the Trail of Tears was a brutal relocation policy that forced thousands of Native Americans out of their home and to Oklahoma. After the Civil War, Native Americans were still being forced out of their homes and moved to Indian Reservations. In these reservations, white culture was forced upon the young generation of Native Americans, and many traditions and values have been forgotten over the years due to the reservations. The biggest goal in Cherokee, North Carolina is to continue the Native culture and never let people forget how American Indians fought to keep their culture. As stated before, white Americans showed no mercy when it came to relocating Native Americans, even after some adopted American traditions and