Navajo People Research Paper

The Navajo people have a had a long, tumultuous, history with the United States. For the longest time however, the Navajos’ relationship with the United States was not what defined the Navajo people. The Navajo lead a relatively peaceful life until they made contact with neighboring tribes, and the sudden appearance of strange foreigners near their lands. Before contact was made with outside peoples, the Navajo mostly functioned as a hunter-gatherer society. This nomadic lifestyle was the commonplace until the Navajo met the Pueblo people. The Navajo and Pueblo peoples had a long relationship according to Navajo oral history, and the Navajo people learned much from the Pueblo. The Navajo ceased to be a hunter-gatherer society, and began to

It wasn’t until half a century had passed after the discovery of the New World when the Spanish officially met the Navajo in 1540 ( http://navajopeople.org/blog/first-contact-with-the-navajo-1540/). By this time, the Navajo had greatly advanced from being hunter-gatherers, and had established a series of trade routes with the nations surrounding the Navajo. The Spanish were open to trade with the Navajo and few other neighboring tribes, and eventually, an alliance was formed between the Spanish, Hopi, and Navajo to fight against nearby hostile tribes. However, even throughout this time of “alliance” with the Spanish, there were many skirmishes that took place between the Navajo and Spanish people. Minor raids were perpetrated by both nations against each other, which slowly turned the citizenry against each other. The constant skirmishes lasted far into the 1800s, and even with several peace accords being signed, the small conflicts continued on and on until 1846 ( Correll, J. Lee (1976). Through White Mens Eyes: A contribution to Navajo History) when the United States reached Navajo

military during the Mexican-American War in 1846, and they certainly brought the war with them. Most of the initial interaction between the Navajo and the U.S. was ugly. Raiding was common by both sides, often livestock, women, and children were the targets of these raids, and animosity grew unchecked between the two factions. This animosity continued until 1849, when a treaty was signed that ended the jurisdiction of Navajo land over to the United States from Mexico. This treaty allowed the United States to build trading posts and forts upon Navajo land in exchange for peaceful relations and for the U.S. to supply the Navajo with certain goods. The forts were built supposedly as a method to prevent the raids that had been happening for a long period of time, however they proved to do little to stop