Barbarism

by Aama Harwood

Growing up in an old mining town nestled between the Navajo and Ute reservations in Southwest Colorado, the words "savage" and "barbarian" conjure images of a history laden with violence and contradiction. I think of how settlers brought with them a vision of civilization defined by riches, conquest, and domination, imposing their own will and brutalities on those they deemed "barbaric." Indigenous people were forced onto barren lands, away from their homes and sacred spaces, where violence and poverty became echoes of an ongoing legacy of erasure. These lands bear scars etched into the mountains, the soil, the people, and the customs that struggle to survive in this fractured landscape. Even today, the valley’s settlements remain predominantly white, standing as silent monuments to the settlers’ self-justified vision of progress; this unsettling testament to colonial conquest continues to pulsate through the nation and the world.