American frontier
Also called: Frontier · Topic: Settler Colonialism: Native Peoples of America and Australia · NCERT: Class 11, Ch 6 "Displacing Indigenous Peoples"
Meaning
The American frontier was the western edge of European settlement in the USA. It kept moving west as settlers took more land, and native peoples were pushed back with it. For settlers it meant open land and new chances, but for natives it meant losing their homes. Historians say the frontier came to an end in 1892, when the USA's spread across the continent was complete.
Example
After the frontier closed in 1892, the USA looked overseas. Within a few years it took colonies of its own in Hawaii and the Philippines and became an imperial power. Karl Marx called the frontier "the last positive capitalist utopia", meaning a place where the endless hunger for profit seemed to have endless land to feed on.
Don't confuse with
- Reservations: the frontier was the moving edge of white settlement. Reservations were fixed pieces of land where natives were shut in after being pushed off their own land.