« Indigenes to migrants to settlers: Mary L. Mullen, ‘How the Irish Became Settlers: Metaphors of Indigeneity and the Erasure of Indigenous Peoples’, New Hibernia Review, 20, 3, 2016, pp. 81-96
Indigenous suicide and settler societies: Simon Hatcher, ‘Indigenous Suicide: A Global Perspective with a New Zealand Focus’, Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, 61, 11, 2016, pp. 684-687 »

Settler colonialism as affliction: Seth Archer, ‘Colonialism and Other Afflictions: Rethinking Native American Health History’, History Compass, 14, 10, 2016, pp. 511–521

18Oct16

Abstract: Scholarly debate persists about the role of disease in the European colonization of the Americas. Were human pathogens the shock troops of conquest or a by-product of colonial incursions? Biological warfare or an accident of ecology? Historians and other scholars have recently raised the stakes on this 500-year-old debate by questioning the received narrative of Native American disease and depopulation after 1492 – in particular, the notion of “virgin soil” epidemics. This article reviews that new literature and makes a case for understanding the Native health past in all its complexity. Departing from a growing consensus about the contingent role of disease in the colonial process, the article suggests ways to develop the broader history of Native American health.


Filed under: Uncategorized   |  Closed