Chapter 5 situates the French fur traders and their first settlements in what is now modern-day Canada and Acadia. Chapters 2 through 4 detail the arrival of the Spanish and the expeditions of their conquistadors in Central America. Notably, Taylor opens Chapter 1 with a history of Indian settlements on the continent before the Europeans arrived in 1492. Scholars widely accept American Colonies as a seminal work on this period. There are annotated bibliographies for each chapter, which Taylor limits to cutting-edge scholarship at the time of writing. He writes in clear, narrative prose with little academic jargon and no footnotes. Taylor often forgoes the details of microhistory-individuals and specific events-to cover the big picture, or macrohistory. He utilizes especially three tracts of scholarship: “an Atlantic perspective, environmental history, and the ethnohistory of colonial and native peoples” (xiii). Using recent historiography, Taylor breaks the typical temporal and geographic boundaries on colonial America to present a more diversified perspective. Colonization was a messy, transformative process for both the colonizers and those they colonized. European colonists, Indians, and Africans regularly interacted with, changed, and adapted to each other, creating a complex composite culture which Taylor marks as the true measure of American distinctiveness. These regions, however, did not operate independently. Arranged in chronological order, 19 chapters serve as case studies for the process of colonization in different regions. In calling his book American Colonies rather than, say, Colonial America, he signals his intent to present the continent’s colonial history rather than the history of the English.Īmerican Colonies focuses primarily on the process of colonization: the introduction of new ideas, peoples, religions, cultures, technologies, even microbes, and the reactions that resulted.

Traditionally colonial narratives concentrate on the English colonies that became the first 13 states, but Taylor rejects this Anglocentrism. This inclusivity reflects Taylor’s primary goal of presenting a pluralistic history. American Colonies covers a broader temporal and geographical range than most works of its kind, spanning from the earliest Paleolithic settlements in North America in 15,000 BCE to 19th century exploration of the Pacific. Taylor aims to expand, enrich, and complicate our understanding of this period.

Taylor american revolutions