Ch 1

Before reading chapter 1 I thought that it would be similar to things that I read in high school or things that we had been taught in school.  The reading didn't even come close to what I thought it would be.  It was nice to learn new things such as the Bering land bridge that linked Northeast Asia and far Northwest North America during late Ice age. Knowing that their were different types of Indians during different eras such as the Paleo-Indians and Archaic peoples was something new I learned.  It was interesting to read about how they began domesticating wild animals such as sheep,goats, and cattle as early as 8000 but the Americans lacked large animals suitable for domestication they actually found llamas, turkeys and guinea pigs and dogs only suitable for taming.  I found this interesting because they attempted to tame other animals and we've learned from them which animals we can have as pets and which ones we can't.  They hoped that by being able to tame animals they would be able to use them as transportation but they soon found that they would have to rely primarily on human power for carrying goods and dragging loads.  Indian societies had their own political standpoint in how their society would govern.  They demanded cooperation and order from their members.  According to the text  reciprocity dominated political and social relationships among individuals and between leaders and their followers. After reading the text I thought about the stereotypes that people have about Native Americans and how we thought of them to be ignorant, it goes to show that its only a stereotype because after reading the text, that is not proven to be true.