European Integration

The key development in the study of European integration is the growing awareness of the "new world" created for both whites and Indians as a result of their contact. Earlier histories showed the creation of the European civilization over Indian "savagery", or illustrated the decimation of native peoples through military defeat and disease. In both versions, native peoples were seen primarily as passive victims, but recent analyzation of past writings and tell another story entirely. They draw the attention to the enduring native resistance to white domination. Even more importantly to the multiple forms of cultural adaptation and accommodation that took place on both sides. This paper will explain these ways in which the west served to orientalize the native inhabitants of the new world, and will show why the European integration was fundamentally wrong from all aspects.

The first way to describe the Europeans differences from the "other" is religion. As seen in the early drawings of the universe, it is illustrated with earth at the center. Within earth was a place meant to represent hell, and above to represent heaven. This shows how religion influenced early European scientific understanding. As time progresses, the maps begin to show less religious symbolism and more scientific rationalism. But the notion of religion was not eliminated. Nicholas of Cusa explains this by stating he saw the universe as containing everything except God, who contained it. This understanding was applied to the later maps not showing religious presence at all. The aspects that were not understood were derived by religious means, such as the planet’s orbits being perfectly circular and symmetrical, showing God must have created everything in perfect order and harmony. The Native Americans developed religious systems that were composed of cosmologies—creation myths, transmitted orally from one generation to the next. This went to explain how those societies had come into being. Most natives worshiped an all-powerful creator or “Master Spirit”. They also venerated a spirits of lesser supernatural entities, including an evil god who dealt out disaster, suffering, and death. Though some aspects of native religion were similar to the European’s Catholic and Protestant religions, the lack of scientific rationalism in accordance was one reason the natives were seen as inferior.

In addition to the natives lack of scientific rationalism involved within their religious practices, was also the lack of scientific structure involved in their economic functions. As shown in the first illustrations of early natives, their societies consisted of mainly just their homes.