Overview

Spanish missions in North America were once viewed as confining and stagnant communities, with native peoples on the margins of the colonial enterprise. Recent archaeological and ethnohistorical research challenges that notion. Indigenous Landscapes and Spanish Missions considers how native peoples actively incorporated the mission system into their own dynamic existence. The book, written by diverse scholars and edited by Lee M. Panich and Tsim D. Schneider, covers missions in the Spanish borderlands from California to Texas to Georgia. Offering thoughtful arguments and innovative perspectives, the editors organized the book around three interrelated themes. The first section explores power, politics, and belief, recognizing that Spanish missions were established within indigenous landscapes with pre-existing tensions, alliances, and belief systems. The second part, addressing missions from the perspective of indigenous inhabitants, focuses on their social, economic, and historical connections to the surrounding landscapes. The final section considers the varied connections between mission communities and the world beyond the mission walls, including examinations of how mission neophytes, missionaries, and colonial elites vied for land and natural resources. Indigenous Landscapes and Spanish Missions offers a holistic view on the consequences of missionisation and the active negotiation of missions by indigenous peoples, revealing cross-cutting perspectives into the complex and contested histories of the Spanish borderlands. This volume challenges readers to examine deeply the ways in which native peoples negotiated colonialism not just inside the missions themselves but also within broader indigenous landscapes. This book will be of interest to archaeologists, historians, tribal scholars, and anyone interested in indigenous encounters with colonial institutions.

Full Product Details

9780816530519

Table of Contents

Reviews

What makes this volume unique and significant is the integrative theme across regions where archaeologists do not share their results frequently enough, and the focus on Native American actions and agency in various colonial encounters. Stephen W. Silliman, editor of Collaborating at the Trowel s Edge: Teaching and Learning in Indigenous Archaeology

This volume is a valuable contribution to the literature on Spanish colonialism and colonialism in general, both for the update it provides on Spanish mission archaeology in the United States and for the direction it offers on how and why to apply an indigenous landscape perspective. Southwestern Historical Quarterly With its breath and scope, Indigenous Landscapes enriches the story of the contested lands on New Spain s northern frontier. Catholic Southwest

This multifocal study challenges long-held assumptions, opening important avenues of inquiry into social interaction across the lower North American continent. Economic Botany

What makes this volume unique and significant is the integrative theme across regions where archaeologists do not share their results frequently enough, and the focus on Native American actions and agency in various colonial encounters. --Stephen W. Silliman, editor of Collaborating at the Trowel's Edge: Teaching and Learning in Indigenous Archaeology

Author Information

Lee M. Panich is an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology at Santa Clara University.

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