Native Americans, who have lived on the North American continent for at least 20,000 years, had an enormously complex impact on American history and racial relations. During the colonial and independent periods, a long series of conflicts were waged, with the primary objective of obtaining resources of Native Americans. Through wars, massacres, forced massacres, forced displacement and the imposition of treaties, land was taken and numerous hardships imposed.

In 1540 AD, the first racial strife was with Spaniard Hernando de Soto's expedition who enslaved and murdered in many New World communities. In the early 18th century, the English had enslaved nearly 800 Choctaws. After the creation of the United States, the idea of Indian Removal gained momentum. However, some Native Americans chose or were allowed to remain and avoided removal where after they were subjected to racist institutions in their ancestral homeland. The Choctaws in Mississippi described their situation in 1849, "we have had our habitations torn down and burned, our fences destroyed, cattle turned into our fields and we ourselves have been scourged, manacled, fettered and otherwise personally abused, until by such treatment some of our best men have died. "

Joseph B. Cobb, who moved to Mississippi from Georgia, described Choctaws as having "no nobility or virtue at all," and in some respect he found blacks, especially native Africans, more interesting and admirable, the red man's superior in every way. The Choctaw and Chickasaw, the tribes he knew best, were beneath contempt, that is, even worse than black slaves.

Ideological expansionist justification (Manifest Destiny) included stereotyped perceptions of all Native Americans as "merciless Indian savages" (as described in the United States Declaration of Independence despite successful American efforts at civilization as proven with the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Creek, and Choctaw. An egregious attempt occurred with the California gold rush, the first two years of which saw the deaths of thousands of Native Americans. Under Mexican rule in Californian Indians were subjected to de facto enslavement under a system of peonage by the white elite. While in 1850, California formally entered the Union as a free state, with respect to the issue of slavery, the practice of Indian indentured servitude was not outlawed by the California Legislature until 1863.

Military and civil resistance by Native Americans has been a constant feature of American history. So too have a variety of debates around issues of sovereignty, the upholding of treaty provisions, and the civil rights of Native Americans under U. S. law.

Once their territories were incorporated into the United States, surviving Native Americans were denied equality before the law and often treated as wards of the state. Many Native Americans were relegated to reservations-constituting just 4% of U. S. territory-and the treaties signed with them violated. Tens of thousands of American Indians and Alaska Natives were forced to attend a residential school system which sought to reeducate them in white settler American values, culture and economy, to "kill the Indian, save the man. "

First, the U. S.government created policies to remove and concentrate the Native Americans somewhere else. With the transcontinental railroad being finished in 1869, it gave more white settlers the opportunity to get land in the frontier. There was a problem because “they asked how two cultures so different from each other could live side by side”. The Indians knew that if they did not fight, they would lose their land.

One plan was concentration. The attempted to keep the Indians in one specific area in the West. The Native Americans could live as normal, but within those borders. Hopefully this would decrease the fighting between the Native Americans and the whites. After the Civil War, the government policy was modified. They now moved the Indians onto reservations. “Most reservations were too small to support the hunting way of life. Therefore, the Indians were supposed to get food through… farm [ing], although reservations were located on the poorest land” (Todd 491). The Indians were swindled by the whites. The Americans did things like mix flour and sawdust or steal goods and then sell them instead of handing the out to the Indians like they were supposed to do (Jordan, Americans 415). The Indians were just trying to cooperate with the treaties they signed; however, they were being cheated.

Most of the Native Americans “were nomadic and nonagricultural, and all depended for survival on hunting the …buffalo”. Their everyday lives “revolved around the buffalo hunt” (Jordan, United 420). The settlers had realized that the buffalo hide could be made into leather. They also saw buffalo hunting as a fun pastime. The whites killed an estimated three million buffalo each year over a three year period, and it hurt the Indians because they were forced to change much of their daily lives (Jordan, United 425).

Additionally, most of the Native Americans either starved while living in the reservations or were killed in fighting. The government's plan collapsed for two reasons. First, the Indians needed to buffalo to survive, so they had to leave the reservation to get buffalo. Second, because of the gold found in Colorado in 1858, many people traveled Westward and did not care for the Indian's rights (DiBacco 306). Unhappy with the land they received, the Indians had no choice but to revolt. They would have died from starvation otherwise. The Indians were also agitated by the Americans because the Americans were not holding up their part of the deal. Also, some groups refused to leave their homeland. The government tried to move the Indians out of the way, but it was not effective.

Second, the government then tried just to exterminate the Native Americans. There were many battles between Indians and Americans. The leaders were the Sioux and the Cheyenne (Jordan, Americans 415). At one point, Chief Black Kettle of the Cheyenne had agreed to cease fire. He hung the American flag and the white flag of surrender. However, Colonel Chivington did not know about the armistice and attacked the Cheyenne, killing 450 Native Americans (DiBacco 306). It was called the Sand Creek Massacre. The Sioux Indians also had many battles with white settlers. After invading a white settlement in 1862-1863, the Sioux Indians lost their leader, Little Crow. The Sioux War finally came to an end in 1868 (DiBacco 306).

Although the Indians were technologically at a disadvantage, they had “resistance [that] was remarkable” (Todd 493). The Sioux were finally guaranteed land in Black Hills South Dakota. However, in 1876 gold was discovered there, and the Sioux were instructed to be moved again. The removal was under the control of General George Custer, a well-known Indian warrior. In June of 1876, he struck a Sioux and Cheyenne camp. This group of “warriors had two outstanding leaders. One was Sitting Bull, able, honest, and idealistic. The other was Crazy Horse, uncompromising, reckless, a military genius, and the most honored hero of the Sioux" (Todd 493). Custer and all 264 of his troops were killed. This was the last big loss of the Americans, and created quite a discomfort for the United States government (Todd 493). “In 1889 the Sioux made one more attempt to keep their way of life” (Jordan, Americans 418). The troops engaged in one more “battle" even though it was truly a massacre. The Battle of Wounded Knee took place in 1890 (Jordan, United 425). This battle was the final fight of the Indians against the United States military. In the end approximately 200 Native American men, women, and children had been killed (DiBacco 308). This extermination policy set up by the government was successful; however, thousands of Native Americans died.

Last, the government thought that the Indian's needed to be assimilated with the American culture. The Indian's way of life was completely destroyed. Most of the Americans did not accept or respect the Indian cultures. Most people believed that if the Indians were to survive any longer in the United States, they would have to have the same habits and traditions of the Americans. The Native Americans had to be absorbed into the white culture. The government funded churches and schools for the Native Americans. They wanted to educate the Indian children how to talk, dress, work, and think like whites. The American government passes the Dawes Act in 1887 (Jordan, United 425).

The act basically divided up the reservations and each family was given their own land to cultivate. After 25 years, the family would own the land and have citizenship in the United States. The Dawes Act really did not help out the Indians at all, because the quality of the land was very poor and they were untrained and didn't have any tools. Disease and malnutrition was very common and many people died. The badly trained and uncharitable teachers taught the Indian children that being an Indian was a bad thing, and that they are worthless. Despite the fact that it sounded like a good deal, assimilation failed.

Native American owned slaves

Before removal and "under white influence", some Southern Native American tribes owned African American slaves. The Cherokee, Choctaw, and Chickasaw were known to have had slaves. However, "unlike white slaveholders, they encouraged the young black slaves to attend the schools opened for the Indian children. The children they had with black women and men were raised in practical equality with their full blooded offspring." Unlike the United States before Emansipation, African Americans (and European Americans) were allowed to become citizens of their respective Native American nations; however, it was rare for African Americans to become citizens of Native American nations. For example, a small number of "Free People of Color" lived in many Native American nations as Cherokee, Choctaw, or Creek citizens.

1.b Racism against the African Americans

Perhaps the most prominent and notable form of American racism (other than imperialism against Native Americans) began with the institution of slavery, during which Africans were enslaved and treated as property. Prior to the institution of slavery, early African and non-white immigrants to the Colonies had been regarded with equal status, serving as sharecroppers alongside whites. After the institution of slavery the status of Africans was stigmatized, and this stigma was the basis for the more virulent anti-African racism that persisted until the present.

In colonial America, before slavery became completely based on racial lines, thousands of African slaves served European colonists, alongside other Europeans serving a term of eternal servitude. In some cases for African slaves, a term of service meant freedom and a land grant afterward, but these were rarely awarded, and few former slaves became landowners this way.

Slaves were primarily used for agricultural labor, notably in the production of cotton and tobacco. Black slavery in the Northeast was common until the early 19th century, when many Northeastern states abolished slavery. Slaves were used as a labor force in agricultural production, shipyards, docks, and as domestic servants. In both regions, only the wealthiest Americans owned slaves. In contrast, poor whites recognized that slavery devalued their own labor. The social rift along color lines soon became ingrained in every aspect of colonial American culture. Approximately one Southern family in four held slaves prior to war. According to the 1860 U. S. census, there were about 385,000 slave owners out of approximately 1.5 million white families.

In the early part of the 19th century, a variety of organizations were established advocating the movement of black people from the United States to locations where they would enjoy greater freedom; some endorsed colonization, while others advocated emigration. During the 1820s and 1830s the American Colonization Society (A. C. S) was the primary vehicle for proposals to return black Americans to greater freedom and equality in Africa, and in 1821 the A. C. S. established the colony of Liberia, assisting thousands of former African-American slaves and free black people (with legislated limits) to move there from the United States. The colonization effort resulted from a mixture of motives with its founder Henry Clay stating; "unconquerable prejudice resulting from their color, they never could amalgamate with the free whites of this country. It was desirable, therefore, as it respected them, and the residue of the population of the country, to drain them off".

“Our definition of a nigger, no matter what color they are, is a dirty, lowdown person who takes and takes and takes from society and does not give anything back," stated a Klansman when asked his opinion about blacks (Ku Klux Klan).

Thousands of Americans do not judge people by race, yet the “KKK” still has problems dealing with race. The Ku Klux Klan is a hate group that committed and demonstrated terrible crimes.

The Ku Klux Klan began in the South after the civil War. Poor whites resented the freeing of Negro slaves and were determined to keep them in their place, i. e. inferior. Negroes who were considered "uppity" were tarred and feathered or even lynched. There was strict segregation on buses and in cinemas Negroes had to sit in their own areas, which were not as comfortable. They were not even allowed to sit in the same restaurant or go to the same schools as whites.

By 1925 there were 5 million members of the Ku Klux Klan and it was spreading to the north-eastern cities, e. g. Chicago, Cleveland, New York. This was because Negroes were moving there to find jobs and a better standard of living than in the South. There was a strong misconception “the blacks should live in poverty, should work for low salary and should have no equal rights, as the whites do have”.

They found them, but still encountered widespread discrimination, though obviously not as bad as 'it had been in the South.

The New Century period is sometimes referred to as the worse race relations because racism in the United States was worse during this time than at any period before or since. Segregation, racial discrimination, and expressions of white supremacy all increased. So did anti-black violence, including lynchings and race riots.

In addition, racism which had been viewed primarily as a problem in the Southern states, burst onto the national consciousness following the Great Migration, the relocation of millions of African Americans from their roots in the Southern states to the industrial centers of the North after World War I, particularly in cities such as Boston, Chicago, and New York (Harlem). In northern cities, racial tensions exploded, most violently in Chicago, and lynchings - mob-directed hangings, usually racially motivated-increased dramatically in the 1920s. In 1946 Einstein called racism America's "worst disease".

1.c Racism against the Asian Americans

In the Pacific States, racism was primarily directed against the resident Asian immigrants. Several immigration laws discriminated against the Asians, and at different points the ethnic Chinese or other groups were banned from entering the United States Nonwhites were prohibited from testifying against whites, a prohibition extended to the Chinese People Hall. The Chinese were often subject to harder labor on the First Transcontinental Railroad and often performed the more dangerous tasks such as using dynamite to make pathways through the mountains. The San Francisco Vigilance Movement, although ostensibly a response to crime and corruption, also systematically victimized Irish immigrants, and later this was transformed into mob violence against Chinese immigrants. Anti-Chinese sentiment was also rife in early Los Angeles, culminating in a notorious 1871 riot in which a mob comprising every other nationality then resident in the city.

In the ensuing inquests and trials, all the perpetrators either were acquitted, or received only light punishments for lesser offenses, because the testimony of Chinese witnesses was either completely inadmissible, or else considered less credible than that of others. Legal discrimination of Asian minorities was furthered with the passages of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, which banned the entrance of virtually all ethnic Chinese immigrants into the United States until 1943.

During World War II, the United States created internment camps for Japanese American citizens in fear that they would be used as spies for the Japanese. Currently implemented immigration laws are still largely plagued with national origin-based quotas that is unfavorable to Asian countries due to large populations and historically low U. S. immigration rates.

1.d Racism against the Latinos

Americans of Latin American ancestry (often categorized as “Hispanic”) come from a wide variety of racial and ethnic backgrounds. Latinos are not all distinguishable as a racial minority.

After the Mexican-American War (1846-1848), the U. S. annexed much of the current Southwestern region from Mexico. Mexicans residing in that territory found themselves subject to discrimination. It is estimated that at least 597 Mexicans were lynched between 1848 and 1928 (this is a conservative estimate due to lack of records in many reported lynchings). Mexicans were lynched at a rate of 27.4 per 100,000 of population between 1880 and 1930. This statistic is second only to that of the African American community during that period, which suffered an average of 37.1 per 100,000 populations. Between 1848 to 1879, Mexicans were lynched at an unprecedented rate of 473 per 100,000 of population.

During The Great Depression, the U.S. government sponsored a Mexican Repatriation program which was intended to encourage Mexican immigrants to voluntarily return to Mexico, however, many were forcibly removed against their will. In total, up to one million persons of Mexican ancestry were deported, approximately 60 percent those individuals were actually U. S. citizens.

The Zoot Suit Riots were vivid incidents of racial violence against Latinos, Mexican-Americans, in Los-Angeles in 1943. Naval servicemen stationed in a Latino neighborhood conflicted with youth in the dense neighborhood. Frequent confrontations between small groups and individuals had intensified into several days of non-stop rioting. Large mobs of servicemen would enter civilian quarters looking to attack Mexican American youths, some of whom were wearing zoot suits,a distinctive exaggerated fashion popular among that group. The disturbances continued unchecked, and even assisted, by the local police for several days before base commanders declared downtown Los Angeles and Mexican American neighborhoods off-limits to servicemen.

Many public institutions, businesses, and homeowners associations had official policies to exclude Mexican Americans. School children of Mexican American descent were subject to racial segregation in the public school system. In many counties, Mexican Americans were excluded from serving as jurors in court cases, especially in those that involved a Mexican American defendant. In many areas across the Southwest, they lived in separate residential areas, due to laws and real estate company policies.

During the 1960s, Mexican American youth rallied behind civil rights causes and launched the Chicano Movement.

1.e Anti-Semitism and Anti-Islamic movements

Anti-Semitism has also played a role in America. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, hundreds of thousands of Ashkenazi Jews were escaping the actions of Russia and Eastern Europe. They boarded boats from ports on the Baltic Sea and in Northern Germany, and legally arrived at Ellis Island, New York. It is thought by Leo Rosten, in his book, “The Joys of Yiddish”, that as soon as they left the boat, they were subject to racism from the port immigration authorities. The derogatory term “kike" was adopted when referring to Jews (because they often could not write so they may have signed their immigration papers with circles - or kikel in Yiddish).

From the 1910s, the Southern Jewish communities were attacked by the Ku Klux Klan, who objected to Jewish immigration, and often used 'The Jewish Banker' in their propaganda. In 1915, Texas-born, York Jew Leo Frank was lynched by the newly re-formed Klan, after being convicted of rape and sentenced to death (his punishment was commuted to life imprisonment).

The holocaust was an event that began with a single person's hatred for the Jews that erupted into a conflict, which involved the world to the II World War. Adolf Hitler was a man who took the word racism to the ultimate level both metaphorically and literally. He believed that the Arians were superior to not only the Jews but also the rest of the world. He even consider those with the same skin color and similar cultured background to be less superior, so this means that he is racist to even those that are similar to him. This wasn't the worse part however; Hitler soon turned his attention to the literal meaning of racism and dealt with it in a dreadful way. He killed the Jews, thousands upon thousands in concentration camps, or even in their homes. They didn't kill for money or land, but for reasons based on racism. This was the Holocaust and throughout history this act of racism killed the most and is looked at even today, with terror.

The events in Nazi Germany also attracted attention from America. Jewish lobbying for intervention in Europe drew opposition from the isolations, amongst whom was Father Charles Coughlin, a well known radio priest, who was known to be critical of Jews, believing that they were leading America into the war. He preached in weekly, overtly anti-semitic sermons and, from 1936, began publication of a newspaper, Social Justice, in which he printed anti-Semitic accusations such as The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

A number of Jewish organizations, Christian organizations, Muslim organizations, and academics consider the Nation of Islam to be anti-Semitic. Specifically, they claim that the Nation of Islam has engaged in revisionist and antisemitic interpretations of the Holocaust and exaggerates the role of Jews in the African slave trade. The Jewish Anti-Defamation League (ADL) alleges that NOI Health Minister, Abdul Alim Muhammad, has accused Jewish doctors of injecting blacks with the AIDS virus, an allegation that Dr. Abdul Alim Muhammad has denied.

After September,11, 2001 terror acts in the US, the word Muslim is closely associated with terrorism for medium Americans. Again wrong prejudices and judgements cause wrong perceptions. However, it is not reasonable to judge someone by his/her race. After all, you can't judge a book by its cover, so why should we try to judge a person by his or her color. Racism is the major contributing factor in promoting terrorism.

I.2 The Globalization and Racism in Media Age