Speech On Columbus Day - 1430 Words

It seems that every year on this day, Columbus Day, citizens across the nation are addressed with the issue of the â€Å"History of the West.† On one of our district’s campuses this morning, Native American and white students got into a large disagreement about the true happenings of the â€Å"History of the West.† For Native American students, Columbus Day is a day of mourning where these students and families think about the near genocide of their people and culture. For white students, Columbus day can make the student feel deeply insulted and blamed for history that occurred long ago, and bring feelings of frustration as people continue to bring up these issues in the present. Each side accuses the other of inventing history and not having†¦show more content†¦Gretchen Bataille is the author of Native American Representations: First Encounters, Distorted Images, and Literary Appropriations. She describes Columbus’s motives, â€Å"Columbus h ad goals--for god, for glory, and for gold.† The era in which Columbus founded the New World in was a time in which the international slave trade was growing rapidly. On his first day in the New World, Columbus ordered six native people to be seized which came from his personal belief that they would make great servants and would be easily Christianized. He stated, â€Å"They should be good servants and very intelligent, for I have observed that they soon repeat anything that is said to them, and I believe that they would easily be made Christians, for they appear to have no religion...They have no religion and I think that they would be very quickly Christianized, for they have a very ready understanding.† Later, Columbus set policies into place that required forced labor. These policies enabled the white Americans to put Native Americans to work for profit. He also would send â€Å"thousands of peaceful Taino ‘Indians’ from the island of Hispaniola to Spain to be sold.† Another dispute among people today is whether Columbus’s famous voyage in 1492 served as the â€Å"introduction of a new host cell of diseases that would kill millions of the Native American people.† A 1989 study conducted by Leslie Roberts, explores theShow MoreRelatedDebate on Columbus Day Essay918 Words   |  4 PagesTo change Columbus Day to no longer be a holiday would be turning a blind eye to a difficult history, yet still turning that eye away from a history with a side to be celebrated. I instead ask of you to celebrate Columbus Day, learn the full history, including the wrong doings of Columbus and his crew, and celebrate the good change brought about by this event that ultimately led to the lifestyle you lead today. If the wrongs of every event in history were to be scrutinized would we have a historyRead MoreChristopher Columbus and His Legacy: Positive vs. Negative Essay1435 Words   |  6 Pageswill have learned about the famous maritime explorer and n avigator, Christopher Columbus. Born in 1451, Columbus was a Genoese captain commissioned by the king and queen of Spain to find a route to the Indies. However, he sailed the opposite direction of his intended goal by crossing the Atlantic and landing in the Americas, resulting in the discovery of the New World for Spain. Like all major figures in history, Columbus has left behind a legacy that people will always remember him for. The natureRead MorePositive Effects Of The Columbian Exchange837 Words   |  4 Pagesthe impact on the natives was unpleasant, I believe the Columbian Exchange was a positive event for the New World because it brought technological advances, new ideas, and allowed both the New World and the Old World to progress. 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Columbus was also a religious man, and saw Christianity as a missionaryRead MoreChristopher Columbus : What It America?983 Words   |  4 Pages1492 Christopher Columbus finds America Explorer and navigator Christopher Columbus was born in 1451 in the Republic of Genoa, Italy. His first voyage into the Atlantic Ocean in 1476 nearly cost him his life. Columbus participated in several other expeditions after. He has been credited for opening up the Americas to European colonization. Columbus was rejected by Genoa, Portugal, Venice, and Spain for a crew to explore with. During his expedition to America he visited Haiti, Dominican RepublicRead MoreMLKs Speech and Its Effect on Local Civil Rights Movement1913 Words   |  8 PagesMLKs Speech and Its Effect on Local Civil Rights Movement The white man won’t hand out integration on a silver platter. The history of the civil rights is often told on the national scale or following well-known figures and direct-action events such as the sit-in campaign and Rosa Parks’ famous stand on a Montgomery bus. More recently, historians have focused their research on the local level, revealing events that are not prominent, but integral to the larger scale history of civil rightsRead MoreFree And The Home Of The Brave1394 Words   |  6 Pagesbut America takes the cake in terms of popular opinion. America’s particular brand of freedom is something that has been in a constant state of evolution since the days of the revolution. Freedom in North America has also evolved over the centuries of colonization beginning with Columbus. By looking at US history, beginning with Columbus’ landing and the subsequent Spanish colonization, through British colonialism to the birth of America and beyond, we can see that freedom has changed depending on