It is just surprising that the indigenous Americans had a prolific contribution to music played in the United States, and subsequently, the whole world. The revelation that Indians were pioneers of unique genres of music played currently is interesting. The media seems to have deliberately or by design obscured the influence of Native Americans in music. I think the arrival of the colonists in America was the beginning of the attempt to erase the native population both physically and in terms of culture on the surface of the earth.
Ideally, when foreigners arrive at a new place, they are supposed to learn the ways of the natives to fit in. They are supposed to be tolerant, show respect, and collaborate with the locals. However, that seems not to have been the case with the colonists who occupied the land inhabited by the Native Americans. They seem to have had a covert attempt to grab land forcefully and suppress the indigenous people. The killing of thousands of Indians in my thinking was an attempt at committing genocide. At least, in the conventional definition, genocide refers to acts of killing or suppressing particular groups of people with the attempt of wiping them away. These very attempts were committed by the British settlers. And if that was not enough, the white settlers attempted to mix the Indian identity by covertly taking the African slaves to live with them. In the process, they would intermarry and have families with mixed racial identities. From history, and to some extent in the present world, Africans are profiled as an inferior race. Their treatment during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was cruel. If the Indians blended with the Africans, the white settlers would find it justifiable to mistreat and discriminate against them.
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“Rumble” shows both real and institutional racial discrimination. The Indians were killed in huge numbers and when the settlers discovered it would be hard to eliminate all the indigenous people, they targeted their culture. Definitely, music is a very vital component of the culture of any group of people. The Indians had very unique and popular style of singing, playing drums and the guitar. Their music was attracting a lot of attention. However, from producers, DJs, and the media, there were attempts to block the advance of this music. Most of these institutions were owned by the whites, and they thought indigenous music was a threat to their establishment.
Indeed the indigenous Americans have been suppressed. They cannot agitate for their grievances because their music is rarely played, and if it is played, it is rare for credit to be given to them. The media always portrays indigenous populations as primitive; people who do not want to embrace modernism. Many times, the natives are shown wearing masks or with their bodies smeared with red ochre, and their noses pierced. Many of them are also usually shown in the bare deserts, poor and hopeless. The same is not done to those natives making an impact in the transformation of the American society.
In conclusion, banning and obstructing music from a particular group of people is an act of racial injustice. The oppressors are afraid of the voice of the indigenous people. They do not want to be reminded of the land they forcefully took and the thousands of people they killed simply because they were perceived to be inferior. Although the natives have been oppressed and suppressed, I now reckon that they have had a significant contribution to different music genres played today. With time, it is possible that people will see many of the great achievements of the Native Americans, who have always been perceived to be primitive.
