I have no solid answer for when I first remember learning about Columbus’ “discovery” of the New World. I think it must have been late elementary school, though, because I believe by late middle school we were discussing aspects of Native American history separate from Columbus. The earliest stuff I remember learning about Columbus was as an introduction to Native American history as a whole, as screwed up as that most definitely is. Columbus would be used in discussion about Thanksgiving, and he would be used as a sort of lofty figure in educational children’s media. Interestingly, some of the earliest knowledge I remember regarding Columbus was from this children’s media, although I have no idea exactly what pieces of media I’m remembering.
I think I read or watched something as a kid with a character trying to be in their school play, and trying hard to get the role of one of Columbus’ ships—whether it was Niña, Pinta, or Santa María, I have no idea. I remember children’s rhymes, like “Columbus sailed the ocean blue”, and I remember vague celebration or at least acknowledgement of Columbus Day. In a way, I think Columbus is sanitized so heavily in children’s education that very little remains of who he actually was. He was made into a character. While I understand the concept of protecting children from harsh concepts, that will never be a valid excuse in my mind for this fictionalization of Columbus. It’s just lying, and there’s no point in that, especially since all of us then grow up to realize what we were being taught was a load of bullshit. At least we get discussions like these out of it.
We definitely discussed some things in class this week that changed my understanding of the history and almost mythology surrounding Columbus. Columbus’ 1492 journal, for example, is something I had never read before. In them is such a crucial display of his own self-admitted dehumanization of Indigenous people and intentions after meeting them. It’s a short reading, too, something I wish I had been introduced to much earlier in my education, seeing as it’s not particularly hard to understand—just a little disgusting to read. This document—along with the 1493 Doctrine of Discovery, which deifies Columbus much like a children’s book or rhyme—provides a blatant expression of how this example of colonialism was so intrinsically built upon Christian beliefs, an entire faith being used to subjugate people and intending to destroy cultures.