The thesis of Chapter 5 centers on how labor and migration patterns in the Americas shaped the Atlantic world demographically, commercially, and even topographically (Egerton, 150). Indeed, it is not difficult to visualize how the encomienda system the early Spanish colonizers utilized could have led to massive demographic losses, the enrichment of Spanish coffers, and the significant physical alteration of their colonial empire. Where once existed a sprawling indigenous population of 20 million in the Spanish Americas now stood a paltry 750,000 due to the egregious abuses of forced labor and cyclical epidemics (Egerton, 155). Certainly, the silver mines of Potosi and gold tributes paid by Indians made the Spaniards the eminent financial power of Europe at the time (Egerton, 150). Furthermore, the coerced abandonment of fishing and subsistence farming in favor of mining enacted topographical changes of its own. As such, Egerton’s thesis is well-founded.<\/p>\n

Marissa Cervantes states in her own blog post that the chief argument behind The Atlantic World: A History<\/em> is that \u201cthe Atlantic World was a time of exchange of people, commodities, and ideas\u201d<\/a>. This reflects in the authors’ discussion of commingling nationalities and religious sects diffusing throughout the Atlantic world (Egerton, 179). Diverse diasporas of Europeans made their way to North America, escaping religious persecution or simply seeking financial opportunity. William Penn’s namesake colony, Pennsylvania, accepted groups as broad on the Protestant spectrum as Huguenots and Mennonites, as well as sizable groups of German-speakers. We also witness the immigration of secretly practicing Jews, also known as \u201cNew Christians\u201d, journeying to Spanish America. Huguenots were even received in the Dutch Cape Colony. This microcosm of different peoples reflect demographic changes, the free exchange of religious ideas, and the bestowing of the Atlantic its own unique character. Freedom of religious expression came to be a \u201cfoundation myth\u201d of white-settler states, such as the United States, despite the pronounced intolerance of Calvinist Pilgrims. As evidenced, crucial factors in defining the Atlantic World were not merely long voyages or the miserable reality of life on a seafaring vessel. A steady diffusion of Europeans, Indians, and Africans via labor and migration patterns also shaped the Atlantic World.<\/p>\n

…read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The thesis of Chapter 5 centers on how labor and migration patterns in the Americas shaped the Atlantic world demographically, commercially, and even topographically (Egerton, 150). Indeed, it is not difficult to visualize how the encomienda system the early Spanish colonizers utilized could have led to massive demographic losses, the enrichment of Spanish coffers, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9381","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist410-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9381","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist410-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist410-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist410-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist410-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9381"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist410-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9381\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":996384,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist410-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9381\/revisions\/996384"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist410-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist410-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.shroutdocs.org\/hist410-fall2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}