Recognizing that “the encounter between cultures is at the core of colonial history” (xxvii) is not new to scholarship. However, Sean F. McEnroe takes the reader on quite an exceptional journey—very broad in terms of geography, time, and thematic scope, yet deeply contextualized, rich in detail, engaging, and thought-provoking—through cross-cultural interaction in both Americas, from first contact to the enduring stage of nation-states. Constantly moving, from Western Canada's Métis communities and the Great Lakes region, through vast areas of the Unites States and Mesoamerica to the Peruvian coast and the Andes, and down to the Guaraní territories in Paraguay and Uruguay, we learn about the agents, circumstances, mechanisms, and outcomes of these encounters.
Combining the perspectives of the Indigenous actors and the European participants of colonial and early postcolonial history, the author begins his story with negotiators of encounters and culture brokers: native Americans who actually crossed the Atlantic and entered European spaces, as well as Europeans who lived among native people in the dynamic borderlands of transatlantic empires. McEnroe goes on to explore patterns of intermarriage between newcomers and Indigenous people, probing their political, social, economic, and cultural functions and their ramifications for the development of many forms of alliances and, more broadly, new ‘contact societies.’
The author then turns his gaze to the adoption of alphabetic writing to local languages and what such opportunities meant for both sides of the contact, as well as to the emergence of artistic expressions that built on the complex nature of cross-cultural transfer. He also discusses the ambivalent results of Christianization, a complex and highly ‘localized’ process propelled and shaped by both native goals and European agendas, be they Catholic or Protestant. A particularly needed perspective is provided by the chapter on native towns and urban enclaves planted in larger colonial cities, and how early colonial ideas about the separation of repúblicas de indios and repúblicas de españoles evolved and transformed over time toward deeply amalgamated, dynamic, multiethnic spaces during the latter part of the colonial period. The universe of colonial encounters is enriched with geographically diverse examples of Indigenous-European collaboration in broadening the limits of the ‘colonized world’ into hitherto uncontrolled territories or at the expense of rival empires. McEnroe not only aptly describes the nature of political clientship and military alliances, but also—and above all—how they were exploited by Indigenous leaders for their own purposes and according to their culturally specific understandings.
Although most studies dealing with colonial history, and colonial encounters in particular, do not venture to cross the conventional border between the ‘colonial epoch’ and its aftermath, the vast canvas painted by McEnroe reaches into and meaningfully explains the transition from multiethnic colonial empires to independent nation-states in the Americas. This distinctive and much-needed approach allows us to appreciate how long-term patterns of interaction and experience shaped the strategies and decisions of Indigenous leaders, with all of their regional differences and commonalities, in the radically different political landscape of revolution and independence. The latter process “shattered longstanding agreements between European leaders and indigenous elites” (228) and brought about the demise of native forms of territorial organization and their distinctive forms of citizenship. The author convincingly shows how enduring native leadership both contributed to and was ultimately transformed by the profound rupture and deconstruction of the sociopolitical system that had shaped European-Indigenous relationships for three centuries. Bridging the two epochs, which are usually seen and studied separately, he offers a novel and thought-provoking perspective for the academic readership.
McEnroe convincingly combines original archival research with the synthesis and recontextualization of existing studies, threading together European and native sources. This approach not only makes it possible to grasp and better understand the cross-cultural competence of many different protagonists of colonial encounters, but also convinces the reader that with time “reciprocal acculturation became rarer and rarer” (231). An excellent example of this process is the recurrent, engaging discussion about Indigenous participation in the educational spaces of North and South America across the colonial era. Although McEnroe aptly emphasizes the creation of “social networks that enabled this multidirectional exchange of ideas” (77) despite the “civilizing mission” of colonial schools, we learn, in fact, quite little about the experiences and perspectives of native students.
Notwithstanding some elements of ‘multiculturalism’ and initial exchanges, the predominant agenda of colonial education with regard to Native Americans was accelerated assimilation within the European universe of knowledge production and transmission, along with its claims of epistemological superiority. And although scholars working with sources written in native languages have indeed been able to retrieve some of the silenced voices of Indigenous protagonists and open up entirely new chapters in colonial history, sometimes the archival imbalance in favor of the colonizers’ perspective is especially salient. No historian can escape that bias, given the nature of the available documentary corpus and the way that written testimonies were produced in the colonial era. This, in fact, is yet another enduring reflection of the “troubled marriage” that developed and operated as “a union of nations, families, institutions, and individuals” (230) but rarely, if ever, on equal grounds.
