I learned about Columbus’ ‘discovery’ of the Americas in 4th grade. I remember learning the rhyme, ‘in 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue’, immediately after learning about the Inca, Aztec, and Mayan civilizations that existed prior to colonization and doing some hands-on projects like making mud bricks and scale models of Aztec buildings. I didn’t learn much about the aftermath of Columbus’ arrival until high school, and I think in elementary school the history was framed in such a way that it suggested that the indigenous people died off due to germs accidentally brought in from Europe, which omits the severity of Iberian colonial violence.
In my freshman-year social studies class, I learned about the actual events of Columbus’ ‘discovery’ and the extent of the violence enacted on indigenous people, especially through the tribute system and the way that colonizers would maim indigenous people for not meeting the production quotas put in place. We learned about the extreme decline in the population of the island, and it was made very clear that this occurred through intentional colonial violence and not accidental disease or any kind of weakness on the part of the Taíno people. We read the same journal excerpt used in this class and once again marveled at the contradiction between Columbus’s observation and seeming enjoyment of Taíno culture and the violence he enacted on those same people. I think that reading this excerpt in full provided valuable insight into the very twisted minds of these early colonizers and revealed the dissonance between the mythical, exoticized image of indigenous people they constructed and the way they treated these people.
The thing I learned most about this week is how diet played into colonization through the reading we did, ‘”If You Eat Their Food…”: Diets and Bodies in Early Colonial Spanish America’ by Rebecca Earle. Although I’ve certainly thought about food and colonization from an ecological perspective, I haven’t put much thought into the sociological and historical implications of these changes and how they show the contradictions of white supremacist ideology. I thought it was interesting that Earle described race as “mutable and porous” (713) in the early colonial era, and as I was reading this article I wondered about how this view may have shaped South American society and led to more racial diversity and less divide compared to how racial politics developed in Canada and the US.
Hi Delaney!
It’s always really interesting to hear about how students have deconstructed the Columbus narrative (or they were never given the opportunity/sources to do so). I’m glad that you were able to grapple with the historical reality in high school and even read the same excerpt! It’s so important to go back to the historical documents themselves, because we can see in Columbus’ own writing that he had a negative perception of the Indigenous people he encountered and believed that they should be enslaved. It is hard to argue that his narrative is a simple story about maritime exploration after that.
Rebecca Earle’s piece was one of my favorites. Her book is fantastic too!! I really like her innovative approach towards this history and use of unique sources to bring a new perspective!