Columbian Exchange

1. an historical fact; diseases, plants, animals, cultures were fused.

2. an ongoing event whenever isolated peoples meet "outside" world.

• Crosby concludes:
• Crosby's evidence
• Crosby's account of European dominance
• Reassessing 1492
• Maps

The Caribbean basin was the point of entry for Spanish suppression, colonization and transformation of the America's with a lasting impact on the region's domestic animals, agrarian, mining and governing techniques. Both its indigenous and imported wealth made the Antilles a contested terrain among Western European powers for control of the islands. And until 1830s populations were greater in Latin America, than in Britain's thirteen colonies. Here too lies, with Bartholomew de Las Casas history and the importation of African slaves, the twin origins of a lasting American dilemma where race prejudice, the desire for emancipation, and question of identity commingle only to emerge in a vibrant and new mixture of cultural traditions.