Apocalypse Now and Then?

Abstract

The concluding chapter critically evaluates a received wisdom in the literature that pre-European contact polities collapsed from the impacts of colonialism. An argument is made for a more nuanced perspective on major cultural transformations and a closer interrogation of the implications of terms like collapse. As an alternative, this chapter forwards the thesis that, rather than a single collapse, Native American landscapes underwent a series of major alterations through the colonial era. These were linked to demographic decline and conflict; the emergence of the consumer revolution; the manipulation of debt by colonial and American governments; and the development of capitalism. As a concluding point, the author argues that Native American cultures successfully navigated these changes even as they were transformed by them.