NCERT Class 11th History chapter 10 Displacing Indigenous peoples Notes by Vibha Maam CBSE | English

This post is the precise notes of NCERT class 11 history chapter 10 Notes by Vibha Maam.

Displacing Indigenous peoples

     From the 18th century, immigrants from Europe settled in more areas of South America, Central America, North America, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. This led to many of the native peoples being pushed out into other areas.

Today, Europeans and Asians form the majority in these countries and native are in the minority. 

     Europeans discovered the Americas and Australia. The native peoples were hostile to Europeans. The sources about these people are made possible by the historical works and fiction written by the native peoples and anthropologists. In America ‘the new national museum of the American Indian’ in the USA has been curated by American Indian themselves.

European Imperialism

     After 17th century, Spain and Portugal and other European countries like France, Holland and England began to extend their trading activities to prospect of profit and established colonies in America Africa and Asia; Ireland

     There was a different nature of the control established over the countries.

In South Asia – 

    The East India company (trading company) made themselves into political powers, defeated local rulers and gradually annexed their territories, retained administrative system and collected taxes, built railways, excavated mines and established big plantations 

In Africa –

     Europeans traded on the coast except in South Africa. In the late 19th century, they ventured into the interior and divided Africa as colonies for themselves.

     The word ‘settler’ is used for the Dutch in South Africa, the British in Ireland, New Zealand and Australia, and Europeans in America. The official language was English except in Canada (French).

Name given by Europeans to countries 

America – Name after Amerigo Vespucci

Canada – From Kanata means village Australia – Austral means ‘South‘ Ocean land 

New Zealand– Zea means sea( new sea land)

Geographical features of North America

     The continent of North America extends from the Arctic Circle (N) to the topic of cancer (S) from the Pacific (W) to the Atlantic Ocean(E) 

     Rocky mountains of Arizona and Nevada (desert) Sierra Nevada mountains, to the east Great Plains, The Great lakes, the valley of the Mississippi and Ohio and Appalachian mountain, to the South is Mexico.

Canada:

40% of Canada is covered with forest. Fishing is a major industry. wheat, corn and fruits are grown extensively. Gas and mineral resources are found in many areas.

The Native peoples

     The earliest inhabitants of North America came from Asia over 30,000 years ago by crossing the Bering Straits. gradually they moved further South due to the warm climate. They eat fish and meat (bison, wild buffalo) and cultivated vegetables and maize. they didn’t practice extensive agriculture and large control of land was not an issue. They were making formal alliances and friendships and exchanging gifts.

     They were skilled craftspeople and weavers. many languages were spoken in North America though these are not written down. 

Different terms for native people:-

Aborigine – Native people of Australia.

Aboriginal – Native people of north and South America and the Caribbean

First Nations people – The organised native group recognised by the Canadian government 

Indigenous people – People belonging naturally to a place

Red Indian – The brown complexion people whose land Columbus mistook for India.

     In the 17th century, European traders reached North America for trade of fish and fur.  native people were friendly and helped them in fishing and hunting whereas the Spanish reached South America for gold.       

     The native exchange handicraft and regional food items with Europeans. In exchange for local products Europeans gave blankets, iron, vessels, alcohol to the native. They became addicted to it, which suited the Europeans to dictate terms of trade.

Mutual Perception

     In the 18th century, Western Europeans defined civilized people in terms of literacy, urbanism and organized religion.

     The native of America were considered uncivilized but they were admired by French philosophers by Jean-Jacques Rousseau because they were untouched by corruption of civilization. 

   Wordsworth described them as ‘amid wilds’ because of limited powers of imagination and emotion.

Trade

     Natives exchange goods with Europeans as gifts. they had no sense of the market but European goods sell for profit. They exchanged things to native sometime very little, for a lot of things. They were greedy. They had slaughtered hundreds of beavers for fur and the native were very uneasy about this. 

     Following the first Europeans who were traders, came to settle in America in the 17th century. Many Christians left Europe and went to America and cut down forests and made farms.

The expansion of USA:

     Canada and the USA came into existence at the late of the 18th century. they extended their control over a large territory by the Louisiana purchased from France and from Russia (Alaska) and by war from Mexico. and as they moved the native also were forced to move back.

New Migrants:-

     In the 19th century, Britain and France came to America to own land who would not inherit property. Germany, Sweden and Italy who had lost their land to big farmers. people from Poland were happy to work in the prairies grassland. They bought a huge property at very low prices. The Europeans treated the land differently from the natives.

     They cleared land and developed agriculture for profit. They hunted wild animals for protection of their farms and invented barbed wire in 1873. The climate of the southern region was too hot for Europeans to work outdoors. plantation owners therefore bought slaves in Africa. protests by anti-slavery groups led to a ban on slave trade, but the African and their children who were in the USA  remained slaves.

     The northern states of the USA, were not dependent on plantations, they argued for ending slavery. In 1861-65 there was a war between slavery supported states and against slavery states. At last slavery was abolished. In the 20th century, African- American were able to win the battle for civil liberties and segregation.

     The French settlers repeatedly demanded autonomous political status from1763. It was only in 1867 that this problem was solved by organising Canada as a confederation of autonomous status.

     The native peoples lose their land in the USA, the native were forced to move after signing treaties where American cheated them by taking more land or paying less than promised.

     Cherokees tribe was governed by state laws in Georgia, a state in the USA but they had no rights of citizens.

      In1832, the chief justice of the US, John Marshall announced that Cherokees were a distinct community. They had sovereignty in certain matters.

     US president Andrew Jackson refused to honour the chief justice’s judgment and said they were uncivilized. He ordered the US army to evict the Cherokees from their land and drive them to the Great American Desert.

Justification of settlers (European)

1) They didn’t deserve the land because they did not have any craft skills to produce goods.

2) They didn’t use land to the maximum.

3) They were lazy and uncivilized.

Reservation

     The native were pushed westward but often they moved again if any mineral was found on their land. They were locked off in a small area called ‘reservation’. A series of rebellions from 1865 to 1890 but they were always crushed by the US army.

The gold rush and the growth of industries

     In 1840, gold was found in California (USA) in North America. In the hope of making a quick fortune. This led to building of railway lines across the continent; the USA’s railway was completed by 1870 and Canada’s by 1885.

Industrial revolution 

     The Industrial Revolution happened in England when landless farmers moved to jobs in factories. In North America, industries developed due to the development of railways. industrial towns and factories grew manifold in the USA and Canada in 1860. The USA had been an underdeveloped economy but till 1890, it was the leading industrial power in the world. Extensive agriculture also expanded. 

     The area between the Pacific and Atlantic Ocean was divided into states within a few years. The USA was setting up its own colonies in Hawaii and the Philippines; it had become an imperial power.

Constitutional Rights 

     American settlers had been fighting a long war for their independence for a long time.they demanded democracy. In1770, they came to define Identity of the USA against the monarchies and aristocracies. They wanted constitutional rights like the right to vote and the right to property but they were given only for white men.

The winds of change 

     Till 1920, Indian- American’s health and education conditions were grim.

     White- Americans felt sympathy for the native. This led to a law in the USA ‘the Indian recognition act of 1934’. which gave native in reservations the right to buy land and take loans.

     In the 1950s and 1960s the US and Canadian government would join the native in the mainstream if they adopted European culture but the native did not accept them.

     In 1954, ‘the Declaration of Indian Rights’ was prepared where native peoples accepted citizenship of the USA and their reservation and traditions would not be interfered.

     In Canada, the government announced that they would not recognise aboriginal rights.

 In 1982, ‘A Constitution Act’ accepted the existing aboriginal and treaty rights of the natives.

Australia

    The aborigines(native people of Australia) came from New Guinea over 40,000 years ago. In the late 18th century, there were between 350 and 750 communities in Australia. each with its own language. There is another large group of indigenous people (Torres strait Islander) living in the North.

     They made up 2.4% of the Australian population in 2005. Australia is sparsely populated. The European settlers discovered Australia nearly 300 years later after America. In the 19th and 20th century, they didn’t know that 90% of them would die by exposure to germs, by loss of lands and resources and in battles against the settlers.

     The Europeans sent the convicts to jail, when their jail terms were completed they were sent to Australia on the condition that they did not return to Britain. where convicts ejecting native’s land for cultivation. The native felt bothered and offensive.

Economic Development 

     The economic development of Australia under European settlement was not varied as in America. sheep farms, mining, vineyards and wheat farming followed by  natives. When the states were United and it was decided that a new capital would be built for Australia in 1911, it was Canberra (Kamberra = meeting place).

    Some natives were employed in farms, later, Chinese immigrants provided cheap labour till 1974, in the fear of the majority of dark people from South Asia, they were banned by government policy.

The Wind of Change

     In 1968, the anthropologist W.E.H Stanner gave a lecture entitled ‘the great Australian silence‘-The silence of historians about the aborigines. As communities have distinct cultures, unique ways of understanding nature and climate, textile, painting and carving skills which should be understood, recorded and respected.

     From 1974,’ multiculturalism’ has been an official policy in Australia which gave equal respect to native culture from 1970.

     The UNO and other international agencies began to hear about human rights. The government had always termed the land of Australia Terra Nullius that belongs to nobody.

     Mixed blood children (native+settler) being forcibly captured and separated from their native relatives.

Share this note with your friends and classmates and also comment in the comment section below.

For Novels and books at affordable price you can checkout Checkfirst

Stay tuned for more amazing post & articles like this.