Clearing the Plains: Disease, Politics of Starvation, and the Loss of Aboriginal Life

"This book examines how smallpox changed population dynamics from early contact between native people and Europeans in Canada in the 17th century through the end of the 19th century. Daschuk looks at how new mechanisms of hunting, as well as the trade in beaver fur and bison hide, spread disease amongst native people. Get the weekly Five Books newsletter These diseases radically altered social networks and tribal identities across an enormous swath of time and space. In the 19th century, reservations became breeding grounds for infectious diseases like tuberculosis. So, the book shows how early capitalist trade and then sequestration on reservations, led to horrific mortality among native populations, due to infectious diseases that came over with European traders and colonizers Daschuk looks at three alien mechanisms which altered present day Canada. The introduction of the horse allowed people to travel much faster and further. The introduction of European diseases like smallpox were transported faster and further by horse. And the introduction of trade in beaver skins and guns compounded the former two factors. Introducing guns, germs and horses radically altered the lives of native people. They played a synergistic role with one another. For instance, without the horse and without the motivation of trade diseases would likely have been isolated instead of becoming pandemics. All three of these things worked together to cause enormous disruptions, including migrations and reductions in native population."