Beyond Germs. Examination of the virgin soil theory focusing geographical ethnological and demografic causes

Seminar paper from the year 2016 in the subject History - America grade: A+ Johns Hopkins University course: The Rise and Fall of Empires language: English abstract: In this paper I will examine both the theory of virgin soil epidemics as well as those that complicate it. In doing so I will look at a broad range of scholarship spanning multiple geographical sites numerous Amerindian tribes as well as various colonial powers - England France and Spain. Although a concentration of attention will be placed on the Spanish conquests the aim is to extract a generalized macro view of the germ-centered narrative of European conquest rather than to examine any one battle tribe or oppressor.As a result of my investigation I will dissent from the growing popularity of the theory of germ-dominated colonization and offer a broader more complex understanding of how widespread depopulation of America's aboriginals and the ensuing European hegemony might have more realistically unfolded. Ultimately the reason behind the success of European colonialism is likely not to be the neat dramatic stuff of a major PBS television special but rather in Livi-Bacci's words The unsettling normality of conquest.