Hello everyone and welcome to America under the microscope advance. Hello, Lulu.

Hello James.

And today we're going to continue our talk about native Americans and we're gonna continue our talk about the history. We're gonna be talking about the more darker side of this history.

So, let's start with the early settlers and the whole thanksgiving.

The thanksgiving part of the actual meal was pretty a happy event. They helped out, but afterwards yes, people started dying once more and more people showed up because native Americans didn't have protection from Europeans diseases.

Like... was it smallpox?

Smallpox was a big one, ended up killing millions of native Americans from disease alone.

Ok, if I remember correctly thanksgiving, that was the settlers trying to thank the native Americans for helping them through the harsh winter with their harvest and everything.

It was a harvest festival, I mean, they were being thankful having a successful harvest and then that later became a holiday which we can go into more detail in an episode in the future. But beyond this is there were always clashes between the native population and the Europeans in the English coming over, the English keep wanting to push further and further west and they did bump heads with the tribes and people were killed and massacres did occur.

Back in that part of history, the pilgrims they did not come intentionally trying to invade, they were running away essentially from Europe.

Well, the original settlers the pilgrim yes, they were... they came to the America to set up their own world away from the oppression of England, but later English settlers they did go with the purpose of setting up colonies setting up English colonies for the crown, they were English.

To try to push the native people aside or even get rid of them.

There was a lot more complicated because some tribes were okay with it some while not; some ended up being friendly treated, others fought back.

I remember watching some movies or TV shows. I think for kids in America there was like an old game called cowboys and Indians.

Which this is part of the romanticized version from Hollywood work. The Indian, the native Americans were always portrayed as the bad evil people and the cowboys were the good people and they always killed them. But history is not as black and white as that, in a lot of cases it were the cowboys that weren't so friendly and the natives were just trying to make their way in life and protect their livelihood and culture. Yeah.

What happened to the surviving native Americans?

Well throughout the time up to the nineteen hundreds, the European settlers eventually moved all the way west and the government had wars with different tribes and eventually got to a point where they forced relocated a lot of people into live on reservations.

Reservations. These are like small patches of land reserved for native Americans.

So the government set out these areas of land that were just for the tribes, but the government didn't necessarily give them the best land.

They were forced to relocate to these whether like barren lands more?

They weren't exactly baron, but on some cases they were actually very far away from their cultural native lands. And if they were a nomadic tribe, they were forced to adopt a non-nomadic lifestyle.

Also they have to change their entire culture and lifestyle.

Yeah. And one of these famous events is what we called the trail of tears. All these tribes were forced to locate pretty far away from their native lands to live on a reservation. It’s a very dark time in history.

How do people feel about it now. I mean how do, let's say, European descent like white Americans feel? Because there is a concept called white guilt. Right?

Well yeah, a lot of Americans admit that this was wrong, what people did at that time was wrong. But for the most part, most Americans probably don't even think about it nowadays, they think it was... that was long ago

All in history.

All in history whereas in reality tribes today still face lots of troubles.

Now most of these native American tribes, they live on reservations.

Yes. All well, the native Americans don't have to live on reservations, but yeah, tribes are all on reservations now.

You said they don't have to so they can just live anywhere they want. But does that mean that they have to if they live among the mainstream, let's say, does that mean that they have to abandon their culture Pretty much?

I don't know, you don't have to abandon your culture. And nowadays I mean America is a country where they can practice their own religion if they wish. But if they leave their reservation then they will be treated like every other American and they'll have to pay their taxes and all that stuff. If you live on the reservation...

They don't have to pay taxes?

Reservations have unique laws about them because on the reservation they are controlled by the tribe. The tribe makes the loss.

The tribes who are living on the reservation, they're exempt from federal loss?

They're exempt from some of them, not all of them I mean, they still can't just kill people, but.

But they probably some minor side of laws and regulations.

You know, but unfortunately life on the reservation is a good one because they tend to be fairly poor areas and underdeveloped because they don't get the funding or the support that they need to create a supportive community.

But all of these tribes, there are different tribes, right? What about the relationship between different tribes?

Well, nowadays modern America, the relationship between different tribes is for the most part just relationships with different people, in the past some tribes are peaceful with each other and treated, some did not get along with each other and fought wars.

Oh, so there's no such thing like a camaraderie between tribes like we're all native Americans, no?

Nowadays. Yes. It’s like now there is camaraderie between them. It’s like we're all native Americans. We've all suffered and there's that sense of camaraderie.

Now on that note how many native Americans still live in the united states today?

About four and a half million.

And the total population is about?

Three hundred million plus.

So it’s a very small percentage.

Yes. It’s not a large group at all.

I'm sure then that try to keep their cultures alive, especially if even this four point five million, they are different cultures. So wouldn’t that mean that to keep their cultures alive is quite difficult?

Yeah, it is because four point five million, as you said they're all different tribes. So some tribes do have more members and others have a better job at keeping things, keeping the history and museums and stuff like that and their culture. But some tribes are dying out and losing their culture.

Do they get federal funding or state funding to sort of keep their roots their cultures alive?

To be honest. I'm not entirely sure if they get any. There are definitely universities and an educational or academic facilities that do try to do this or have programs about maintaining this native heritage.

And when it comes to things like applying for universities, applying for a place in universities, does affirmative action apply here? Do they get preferential treatment because they are native American heritage?

Yes, they do. They are beneficiaries of affirmative action laws. They do give benefits for applying for universities because they are of tribe.

That's why sometimes you watch TV shows or movies you see some kids they try to get into good university they would claim that they are one eighth of, for example, of a charity of a native American tribe.

Right they do say that in some Americans actually a lot of Americans say that. There's actually a joke, what do you call eight Americans?

Eight Americans?

One native American.

So everyone has a bit of native American.

That's the joke. But there are some Americans that do um I don't imagine this as high as people claim it is.

So there're bound to be some intermarriages.

There are, there absolutely are.

You said life on these reservations and they'll for these tribes are generally quite rough. They are generally not that developed. Do they have any sort of financial success for example I hear about Indian casinos.

Yes, these are very much a real thing. Now because these reservations do have different laws, many reservations can build casinos that bypass the gambling laws that a state has. So they're able to open up legal gambling in a place where everywhere else is illegal so they can have a monopoly on it and they can make lots of money.

Suppose that's very popular.

Yeah, so near my hometown about a forty five minute drive there is a big Indian, native American casino and it makes that tribe quite a lot of money because people will go there and lose and lose and lose...

Such as what you do in casinos. I guess was that we end this episode otherwise quite heavy episode on a happier note. So hopefully these casinos can get them some of the funding that they need. Anyhow, hopefully these two episodes give you a general idea of what native Americans, what the life of native Americans is like and also the history the relevant history about it.

So thank you all for listening.

If you have any questions to ask anything to share, feel free to leave. Your comment in the comment section. We will see you next time.

Bye everyone.

Bye.