BRUTALITY

Books of Interest
 Website: chetyarbrough.blog

America, América (A New History of the New World)

Author: Greg Grandin

Narrated By:  Holter Graham

Before Professor Grandin, most Americans presumed the United States came from the traditions of the British empire. After reading/listening to America, América, one recognizes the powerful influence of the Spanish empire on the settlement of North America, the attitude of colonists toward minorities, the growth of slavery, and the deep entanglement of Spain in the broader Americas. America, América is a book that widens one’s understanding of the history of the United States.

When being reminded of the many atrocities of colonization and the decimated indigenous natives of the Americas, one is appalled by man’s inhumanity to man. Grandin begins his history of colonization with the Spanish empires’ expansion into the Americas long before the Mayflower expedition to America. Conquistadors set the table for the way what became Americans way to colonize the New England territory. Hernán Cortés and Francisco Pizarro led expeditions that decimated the Aztecs in Mexico and the Incas in Peru. Looking for wealth Spanish conquistadors murdered, raped, and pillaged Latin American native populations. The conquistadors exemplified what became the modus vivendi of British colonists in America. Indigenous peoples were forced to work for Spanish landlords, later supplemented by imported African slaves. The atrocities of Spain in the 16th century are repeated by English settlers in the 17th and later centuries. An estimated 80% of the indigenous people of the Americas perished from disease, forced labor, and ethnic cleansing by Spanish settlers–a grim reminder of American settlers did to indigenous natives in America.

What is so troubling about Grandin’s history is what appears to be the nature of human beings whether royalist, capitalist, socialist, or communist. America, América shows the founding of the United States is a repeat of Spain’s early colonization of the southern part of North America. The human race appears driven by the desire for money, power, and prestige in a system that begins with attack on indigenous peoples and repeats as a perceived advance of civilization. There is some truth in that perception but one realizes indigenous peoples are equally driven and commit human atrocities among themselves in pursuit of value, power, and, or prestige.

This book is returned before completion because of its length. Its history is enlightening but its length is too much for this dilettante.