Ben Peel

AP English Language and Composition

Kelley
10/3/13

Peel 1

What is an American?
Defining what is an American has been debated and researched for hundreds of years.
However, before the colonial period there was only one type of American; the Native Americans.
From the colonial period to the modern age, they have always been the first Americans to settle
in North America. They represent the basic values that our country was colonized for; they were
a free people, they lived in prosperity around the country, each tribe and civilization has its own
unique culture and customs, similar to our own states.
However, when the Europeans came to the new world, they looked down on the natives
as inferior, uncivilized and coldly referred to them as indians They either forced the natives off
their land or killed them outright. Those that survived had the Europeans culture forced upon
them. Chief Red Cloud once stated I will tell you the reason for the trouble. When we first made
treaties with the Government, our old life and our old customs were about to end; the game on
which we lived was disappearing; the whites were closing around us, and nothing remained for
us but to adopt their ways
During the colonial period and up until the late nineteenth century the native Americans
had little say in what they were called or titled. They had been forced off their land and During
the twentieth and twenty-first centuries native Americans have become much more active and
vocal towards the use of the word indian and other racial words. Today, the word indian is widely
considered socially unacceptable.

Ben Peel
AP English Language and Composition
Kelley
10/3/13
Citations:
-http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~jputman/410b/redcloud.htm

Peel 1