The English Empire

The English Empire expanded by them wanting to have total control over of the trade of the Atlantic. The American colonies were thought to be a possible important source of wealth. Therefore, their mother country expanded into America throughout with the thought of mercantilism so they could regulate all of the economic activity that was happening. The English Empire had a dramatic rise in their population in America as the colonies gave off the appearance of being a welcoming place for those who were feeling the need to get away by being overwhelmed, felt that they were too overcrowded, and to those who may have wanted some property of their own.

A few thousand of these migrants went to the Chesapeake Bay colonies that were Virginia and Maryland to own and work in the tobacco fields. Whereas the other thousands of migrants went to establish Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay, New Haven, Connecticut, and Rhode Island colonies so they could live out their lives, as they believed scripture demanded.

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The English looked at the alien peoples with a scorn sight as if they were not equal with the English. Those who were considered as an alien person were the Irish, Native Americans, and African Americans. Europeans saw it as the Irish and Native Americans were refusing to respect their English authority and that they were resisting to be converted to English Protestantism. All of the Europeans would look at and label these aliens with similar descriptions such as being savages, pagan, and uncivilized.

Alien peoples were often compared to as animals when they were talked about. During the seventeenth century, there wasn’t much of discrimination between race rather than the division of those who were civilized versus barbarism or Christianity versus polytheistic. However, later on the anti-black stereotypes did flourish and this caused the African Americans to be seen more as aliens as well. Africans were seen as alien due to their color, religion, and social practices, which labeled them as showing enslavable behavior.

Famine or fear of enemies forced some African tribes to ask for help and surrender themselves in bondage in exchange. Colonists saw them as an opportunity to take an advantage of as they followed that type of behavior. They saw them as an alien and displaying enslavable behavior, and that is what helped lead to Africans being brought over to the Americas as slaves. Those who needed protection or relief of starvation would become the servants of those who provided relief like indentured servants that would turn into slaves. Slavery was assumed as a new aspect when the mercantilist system had a demand for labor supply. Slavery was mainly based on the plantations of the colonies because as they needed a large number of workers to help tend to the lands. Since the large number of workers would be under the control of a single owner, this raised the imbalance of possibility of a slave resistance and wanted to make it necessary to police the system rigidly. This created the line between slavery and freedom. The shipment of slaves to the New World became a large business from the idea of Africans being seen as alien and inferior.

African Americans religions were numerous and various as they were polytheistic. Africans who ended up in British North America kept their traditional religions as they came from the forest regions of West Africa. Their religions varied but they did share some similarities. They believed in spiritual forces in nature and a close relationship between the two worlds of sacred and secular. Majority of the slaves still practiced their traditional African religion even though the Europeans deemed superstition and witchcraft. Meanwhile some slaves came to the colonies with a sense of Christianity and Islam, which would lead to them having to forget their African religion. They had a hard experience of transitioning from their traditional religions to Christianity, as it was a long and difficult process. When the slaves refused to adapt to the Europeans Protestant religious practices they would instead infuse their beliefs with some of the Christianity. For instance, they would add the Christian God to their own pantheon of lesser spirits.