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MODULE 2.2 European Colonization 63

AP ® Skills Workshop: Thinking Historically
These sample pages are distributed by Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers.
Analyzing Developments and Processes in Secondary Sources

Historians call their written interpretations of the past secondary sources. This
textbook, for example, is a secondary source because it includes information about
Copyright (c) 2024 Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers.
the past written by historians. However, this textbook also includes primary
sources, which are sources from the past. For example, the material in the Working
Strictly for use with its products. NOT FOR REDISTRIBUTION.
with Evidence features includes primary sources.
®
In this U.S. history course, and on the AP Exam, you will sometimes have to
read a historian’s argument and identify and explain a historical development or
processes. By development we mean the rise or growth of a trend or historical
change. By processes we mean the details of how a trend or change came
about.
Let’s say you wanted to identify the development of the Spanish colonies,
described in Period 1. When you describe this development, you might say that these
colonies began as a few scattered settlements on the islands of the Caribbean, but by
the mid-sixteenth century, they had expanded to the mainland and began a system-
atic conquest of the indigenous civilizations there.
If you were to explain the process of this development, you could explain that
the Spanish colonies were at first small settlements on islands, which served as
economic and military centers for settlement and trade. These early settlements
allowed the Spanish to launch more ambitious exploration of the Caribbean, the
Yucatán peninsula, and Central and South America. By the mid-sixteenth cen-
tury, the Spanish had destroyed the Aztec empire and had begun to build New
Spain into a colony for larger settlements and greater exploitation of indigenous
people.
A historian might write a paragraph that describes this development and
explains the process like this:

The Spanish colonies began as a few scattered settlements on the
islands of the Caribbean in the early sixteenth century. By the mid-
sixteenth century, these colonies expanded to the mainland and began a
systematic conquest of the indigenous civilizations there. The first Spanish
settlements in the Caribbean served as economic and military centers for
settlement and trade. Settled a few decades after Columbus’s arrival, these
settlements allowed the Spanish to launch more ambitious exploration of
the Caribbean, the Yucatán peninsula, and Central and South America. By
the mid-sixteenth century, the Spanish had destroyed the Aztec empire
and begun to build New Spain into a colony of larger settlements that
exploited more indigenous people. The encomienda system of forced labor
was one method of this exploitation.

ACTIVITY
On the next page is an excerpt about the French in North America during the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Read the excerpt and, in your own words,
describe the development of these French colonies according to the author. Then,
explain the process by which this development occurred.

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