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Ian Jesse defends Jeffers Lennox, Homelands and Empires: Indigenous Spaces, Imperial Fictions, and Competition for Territory in Northeastern North America, 1690-1763. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2017. 

I cannot remember how Homelands and Empires: Indigenous Spaces, Imperial Fictions, and Competition for Territory in Northeastern North America, 1690-1763 by Jeffers Lennox got on my radar but I had been meaning to pick it up for some time. I was, therefore, very excited when I was asked to read and defend it for CHA Reads. Before I dive into my review and defense of this book I want to acknowledge that I am a white settler and approached my reading of this book with a personal lens.

 

In his book, Jeffers Lennox centers Mi’kma’ki/Nova Scotia/Acadia in  his analysis. He reminds us that envisioning northeastern North American as a region comprised of closely connected European colonies during the turn into the eighteenth century is incorrect. While Acadia and Nova Scotia might have existed on maps during this period, Indigenous people controlled this territory. At least until 1763, when  Nova Scotia become a European, namely British, reality and a greater threat to Indigenous homelands. In this space and over time, Lennox argues, “competing notions of territory and environment manifested in European ideas of empire and Indigenous protection of homelands, shaped the kinds of military, economic, and cultural interactions that took place in the Northeast” (13).

Homelands and Empires is divided into six chapters that move chronologically from 1690 to 1763. Chapter 1 highlights how the region was formed in competing imperial fictions between the French and English, and how both sides struggled to create permeant and long-term settlements in Mi’kma’ki, Wulstukwik, and the Dawnland (Wabanaki homelands). The second chapter focuses on the period from 1710 to 1726 and elucidates the ways in which the French and British attempted to cope with Indigenous homelands through treaties and boundary negotiations. During this period the British and French attempted to expand what little holdings they had in the Northeast, but control was difficult to expand beyond the few forts in the region. After all, these “imperial ideas…remained firmly within the lived reality of Indigenous homelands” (46). Lennox’s third chapter covers a period in which a “mutual recognition of coexistence” emerged from 1726 to 1744. During this period the British worked to appease Acadians and Indigenous people and “carefully constructed and monitored areas of interaction that served to maintain a balance of geographic control” emerged (88). These places were commercial, political, and spiritual in nature and in flux. Chapter 4 focuses on the founding of Halifax which represented a dramatic shift from earlier. Halifax signaled to the French and Indigenous peoples of the Northeast that the British presence was now permanent and expanding. Chapter 5 smoothly moves the reader across the Atlantic and focuses on the Acadian Boundary Commission which worked from 1750 to 1755 to determine the borders between Nova Scotia and Acadia and Britain and France’s competing imaginations of the region. The final chapter examines the period covering the Seven Years’ War and argues that by 1763 Nova Scotia was firmly in place. The Acadians had been expelled and the Mi’kmaq could no longer rely on their alliances with the French. Lennox reminds us, however, “Britain threatened, but could not immediately eradicate, Indigenous homelands” (252).

Lennox draws from a range of archival materials including treaties, letters, government correspondence, and magazines. Central to his’s analysis are the various and numerous maps created by the French and British. In addition to marking borders and boundaries, maps depict available resources like dense forests and wildlife, as well as land open for settlement. The inclusion or exclusion of Indigenous toponyms highlight political relationships and claims over territory. As Lennox notes there were differences between French and British maps and he carefully scrutinizes their contents and omissions to understand how Mi’kma’ki/Acadia/Nova Scotia was understood and imagined. Such analysis pushes us to look more closely at maps and consider the context in which they are made.

The strength of this book, and the reason why it should win the Sir John A. Macdonald Prize in my view, is Lennox’s emphasis on Wabanaki agency. From 1690 to 1763, Indigenous people still maintained  control over the territory that would become Nova Scotia. This was a period of Indigenous resistance and persistence. In each chapter Lennox makes it clear that European plans and actions were shaped by Indigenous sovereignty, alliances and actions. In the period between 1710 and 1726 Indigenous people not only made threats but actively disrupted commerce by capturing merchant ships (60). Additionally, resistance from the Mi’kmaq forced the British to reconsider their settlement plans for Halifax. The original plan was for five settlements, but Cornwallis established only one (152). Even across the Atlantic their influence was taken into consideration. Although no Wabanaki people were present for the Acadian Boundary Commission discussions, their presence on the landscape in question and their claims of sovereignty forced the French and British to take them into consideration as well (173). In this manner Wabanaki people were an imperial force on their own.

I think it can be difficult to keep track of the various actors during this historical period, but I did not find this to be the case with Homelands and Empires. Jeffers Lennox’s organization and clear writing style made it easy to follow the people, their ideas, and this story back and forth across the Atlantic Ocean. If you are interested in later periods in history, like myself, it can sometimes be intimidating to pick up a book with a focus on this earlier period. I assure you, however, that it will be difficult to put this book down once you start it.

Homelands and Empires is well researched as Lennox uses material from several archives on both sides of the Atlantic. This book will no doubt find its way on to many readings lists. Scholars who research First Nations history, Atlantic history, borderlands, early Canadian, and early American history will have to engage with this significant book. Additionally, this work has broad public appeal. This book will be of interested to those curious about the creation of Canada. More importantly, as First Nations continue the fight for the return of or compensation for their stolen lands, Lennox’s research will no doubt be useful. His careful analysis of Indigenous, French, and British diplomacy and competing claims over territory make this an exceptional book.

 

Picture of Ian Jesse, with a moose in the backgroundIan J. Jesse is a PhD candidate in History at the University of Maine and the recipient of a 2017-2018 Fulbright Student Award to Canada. His research examines the broad connections between non-domesticated animals and rural communities in the Northeast during the late-19th and early-20th centuries.

 

Join us again tomorrow for Carly Ciufo’s defence of J. M. Miller’s Residential Schools and Reconciliation: Canada Confronts its History.

Don’t forget to check out the other posts in our CHA Reads Series!!

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