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Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe, 900-1900, by ecological historian Alfred W. Crosby explores how “portmanteau biota”, helped Europeans to eradicate whole societies in the Neo-Europes (xv, 89). Crosby believes that temperate zones, climates similar to that of Europe, allowed European biota to thrive, which allowed for European expansion. Crosby discusses the Norse invasions and the Crusades as examples of how Europeans were not able to expand. Crosby claims that climate was crucial to European expansion because it allowed portmanteau biota to thrive. The strength in Crosby’s argument is that he introduces ecology as a crucial factor in European expansion. However, he forgets that without technology, ecological factors would have had a limited role in European expansion to the Neo-Europes.
Alfred W. Crosby is a Professor Emeritus at the University of Texas at Austin where he still teaches history, geography, and American studies. Crosby received his degree from Harvard University in 1952 and then went on to serve in the U.S. Army until 1955. Crosby was involved in the Civil Rights movement, and taught black studies. His research interests include victimized, economically exploited, or enslaved people. He also wrote on commonly ignored topics like disease and its role in society, imperialism, capitalism, intellectual and technological history. Crosby has written many books to include The Columbian Exchange: Biological and Cultural Consequences of 1492 (1972); America’s Forgotten Pandemic (1989); The Measure of Reality: Quantification and Western Society, 1250-1600 (1997); Throwing Fire: Projectile Technology Through History (2002); and Children of the Sun: A History of Humanity’s Unappeasable Appetite...
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Ecological Imperialism provides new insight into the ecological expansion of Europe. The introductory nature of the topic requires more in-depth research. This book is for students, historians, teachers, and public who want an introduction into ecological history or early American history. However, the reader needs to be reminded that without technology, medical science and military power would have been impossible. Without technology, countries are left behind politically, socially, and economically. Crosby explains well that ecology played a minor role in the expansion of Europe into the Neo-Europes. However, it seems that technology played a bigger role in European expansion than any other factor. Penicillin is not a cure for bacterial infections until people had discovered its use and the only way the Europeans were able to get to the Neo-Europes is by ship.
This book is complete with some facts, unfounded assumptions, explores Native American gifts to the World and gives that information credence which really happened yet was covered up and even lied about by Euro-centric historians who have never given the Indians credit for any great cultural achievement. From silver and money capitalism to piracy, slavery and the birth of corporations, the food revolution, agricultural technology, the culinary revolution, drugs, architecture and urban planning our debt to the indigenous peoples of America is tremendous. With indigenous populations mining the gold and silver made capitalism possible. Working in the mines and mints and in the plantations with the African slaves, they started the industrial revolution that then spread to Europe and on around the world. They supplied the cotton, rubber, dyes, and related chemicals that fed this new system of production. They domesticated and developed the hundreds of varieties of corn, potatoes, cassava, and peanuts that now feed much of the world. They discovered the curative powers of quinine, the anesthetizing ability of coca, and the potency of a thousand other drugs with made possible modern medicine and pharmacology. The drugs together with their improved agriculture made possible the population explosion of the last several centuries. They developed and refined a form of democracy that has been haphazardly and inadequately adopted in many parts of the world. They were the true colonizers of America who cut the trails through the jungles and deserts, made the roads, and built the cities upon which modern America is based.
Diamond wrote this book to answer the question of a New Guinean politician, Yali. He asked “Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea, but we black people had little cargo of our own.” Diamond set out to find the answer to this question, to find out why history unfolded like it did. Diamond credits the inequalities in history to differences in environments not biological differences as so many people like to say. Most of the advantages the Europeans had were a direct result of geography. The main points that Diamond attributes to European dominance are early plant and animal domestication and as a result of close contact to animals the deadliest germs were given to the Europeans. As result of its East-West axis the diffusion of food production, technologies, humans and ideas were easily spread throughout Europe. The axis mean that there were similar climatic, geographic, and disease conditions to migrants and no barriers. So anything that could be grown in one area was sure to quickly spread and thrive in the neighboring locations. Moreover, political administration, economic exchanges, incentive for exploration and conquest, and making information available to every individual were facilitated after the development of writing.
European Animals The Major Part They Took In Forever Altering the Ecology of the Americas
How did the development of European colonies in the Americas alter the natural environment? (The Earth and Its Peoples, 474)
Microbes from Europe introduced new diseases and produced devastating epidemics that swept through the native populations (Nichols 2008). The result from the diseases brought over, such as smallpox, was a demographic catastrophe that killed millions of people, weakened existing societies, and greatly aided the Spanish and Portuguese in their rapid and devastating conquest of the existing American empires (Brinkley 2014). Interaction took place with the arrival of whites and foreigners. The first and perhaps most profound result of this exchange was the imp...
The world has always been connected. Through trade routes, the world was accessible to anyone who had goods and resources to offer and sell. However, not all countries and territories were part of this connection. Such as Europe, who lay withering away in their dark ages without connections to trade routes, as the rest of the developed world flourished. However, a change in the 1500 century led to the demise of the established wealth and to the rise to colonizing powers. These colonizing powers were dependent on the exploitation of another country’s resources and population. What led to this shift in power and the belief of colonialism? The search for wealth. Many primary sources describe this shift in power and belief; however, Christopher’s Columbus’ letter to the Luis de Santangel outlines this phenomena with such clarity that it sets and foreshadows the economic and religious foundation for the emerging belief of colonialism; and in turn resulting in some of the first colonization of the Americas.
When the European empires started exploring, they discovered the New World, or North, Central, and South America. They settled colonies and started planting crops like tobacco and cotton. As demand quickly grew in Europe for these pr...
Medicine was another factor that contributed to the growth of imperialism in the Europe. It was easier for the superior European countries to hold their colonies by modernizing medicine in those countries.
The most hotly debated of which has been the population of the Native American 's from the time of Columbus through the Revolutionary War. According to our readings of Alfred Crosby 's paper on the “Virgin Soil Epidemics as a Factor in the Aboriginal Depopulation in America”, he offers the following reasoning behind the debate. “Unfortunately, the documentation of these epidemics, as of the many others of the period, is slight, usually hearsay, sometimes dated years after the events described, and often colored by emotion. Later in his paper, Crosby details how the Native American 's continued to suffer from diseases during the same time that the new settlement of Plymouth was struggling to survive and well into the 19th century. While the exact population of the Native American 's will never be known or completely agreed upon, the common message from all parties is that as more and more Europeans arrived, the Natives suffered and their population decreased. Neal Salisbury, Professor of History at Smith College, agrees with Crosby and our dominant view concerning the impact of diseases afflicting the Native Americans during the Colonial period. He also argues that the “Puritan Colonists were also aware of how the diseases were affecting the tribal populations (Salisbury pg.
The 1800's were a renowned era in European history. With the rise of imperialism came the ruthless desire to seek new land through the use of authoritative implications. Whether it be the discovery of the Americas, where Christopher Columbus discovered various islands, which were clustered with indigenous people that were eventually completely wiped out for the pure desire of Spaniard power. This craving to "assimilate" indigenous people and to convert them to Christianity was an element, which rooted 19th century Europe. Although the actual question to whether these actions were good or evil are up for debate. Imperialism has been viewed as an expansion that serves only ones "object" and that it has no purpose beyond the benefit of the "self". This paper will explain Imperialism through a sociological perspective, while blending in notions of capitalism and modern day Imperialism that may now be viewed as Globalism.
Imperialism evokes images of past grandeur, expansive landholdings and wealth that do not seem to be conducive to modern-day existence. Yet as a general paradigm of behavior, imperialism may be more ubiquitous and inherent than first glance would suggest. By drawing analogy between the actions of historically imperialistic nations and bee colonies, a universal “imperialism” emerges, spanning history and nature. In the Roman Empire and current US “empire” (as some consider it), imperialism is manifested as binary hierarchies and symbols of power. Bee colonies, likewise, exhibit such extensions of imperialism. Thus, we can construct a paradigm for imperialism that functions in many times and places. One thing to note is that the Roman Empire fell, and people are pessimistic about the US’s current situation and global involvement; bees, on the other hand, have sustained their imperialistic behavior for millions of years. The pervasive behavioral similarities between bees and man suggest an underlying genetic cause, but past and imminent troubles with human imperialism suggests that imperialism may also transmitted as a meme, a cultural entity, subject to natural selection.
In Thomas King’s novel, The Inconvenient Indian, the story of North America’s history is discussed from his original viewpoint and perspective. In his first chapter, “Forgetting Columbus,” he voices his opinion about how he feel towards the way white people have told America’s history and portraying it as an adventurous tale of triumph, strength and freedom. King hunts down the evidence needed to reveal more facts on the controversial relationship between the whites and natives and how it has affected the culture of Americans. Mainly untangling the confusion between the idea of Native Americans being savages and whites constantly reigning in glory. He exposes the truth about how Native Americans were treated and how their actual stories were
The foundation for new imperialism rested on the ideas and products of the enlightenment. Advancements in technology, medicine and cartography led to the success of new imperialism (Genova, 2/15). For example, European voyages would have been for naught, if it were not for the enlightenment discover...
The Great Divergence is term used to portray the gradual shift of dominance that Europe gained by establishing itself as the most powerful world civilization by the 19th century. While a case could be made that the Great Divergence occurred because of the pre-eminence of Europe and Britain, as well as their supposed superiority in invention and innovation above anywhere else in the world, this argument is flawed. A more compelling argument would be to state that it was rather through the geographical advantages that Europe obtained that lead it into eventually becoming the most powerful civilization after 1500 A.D., as this essay will strive to demonstrate.
Stott, Anne. "Europe 1700-1914: A Continent Transformed." europetransformed.blogspot.com. University of London, 7 March 2011. Web. 30 November 2013.