How did contact between the European arrivals and the native peoples of the Americas affect both groups?

The above
answer is an excellent one, and it is true that any single answer on a site like this is only
scratching the surface. That said, there are several small "impacts" that can be
gathered under one or two larger umbrellas. It can be argued that the colonization of the
Americas led to both a diversifying and narrowing of experiences and worldviews for both the
Native Americans and the Europeans. In other words, they both learned and lost
learning.

The Natives did indeed gain from the Europeans bringing items from
the "old world" over. For example, they gained access to horses and livestock, and
learned relatively modern animal farming practices, including the concept of dairy farming and
growing wheat. They were introduced to cheap paper-making and a more simplified writing system
than most tribes practiced. They were also introduced to cultures completely different from
their own and gained a greater breadth and depth of knowledge by being taught about the
"old world" and the...

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