The Great Power of Small Nations: Indigenous Diplomacy in the Gulf South

Early American Studies

by Elizabeth N. Ellis

In The Great Power of Small Nations, Elizabeth N. Ellis (Peoria) tells the stories of the many smaller Native American nations that shaped the development of the Gulf South. Based on extensive archival research and oral histories, Ellis’s narrative chronicles how diverse Indigenous peoples—including Biloxis, Choctaws, Chitimachas, Chickasaws, Houmas, Mobilians, and Tunicas—influenced and often challenged the growth of colonial Louisiana. The book centers on questions of Native nation-building and international diplomacy, and it argues that Native American migration and practices of offering refuge to migrants in crisis enabled Native nations to survive the violence of colonization.

Indeed, these practices also made them powerful. When European settlers began to arrive in Indigenous homelands at the turn of the eighteenth century, these small nations, or petites nations as the French called them, pulled colonists into their political and social systems, thereby steering the development of early Louisiana. In some cases, the same practices that helped Native peoples withstand colonization in the eighteenth century, including frequent migration, living alongside foreign nations, and welcoming outsiders into their lands, have made it difficult for their contemporary descendants to achieve federal acknowledgment and full rights as Native American peoples.

The Great Power of Small Nations tackles questions of Native power past and present and provides a fresh examination of the formidable and resilient Native nations who helped shape the modern Gulf South.

Genres: History, Native American History, Indigenous

336 pages, Hardcover

First published November 8, 2022

Reviews

[Filomena Gabriele · Rating 5 out of 5]

Elizabeth Ellis I love you!!! Amazing book that is so well-researched and written and she does an amazing job of combining oral histories with fragmented colonial archival evidence to construct Indigenous perspectives and experiences living under colonial Louisiana

[Craig Werner · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent study of the way that "let Petites Nationes"--the small indigenous nations of the lower Mississippi Valley--negotiated their position between larger Native nations (the Choctaws and Chickasaw) and European colonizers, the French during the early part of the story, later the Spanish and British. Ellis does a beautiful job extracting insights into the indigenous strategies and experience primarily from colonial documents with oral history mixed in when available. During the 17th and 18th centuries, the nations succeeded in exercising much more power and influence than the extremely biased an partial historical record usually acknowledges. Even after European dominance passed from the French to the British, the story remains one of survival, not, as myth would have it, disapperance.

While I occasionally wished Ellis had employed fewer intensifying adjectives, well written and effective.

[Cece · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book showed me a different possibility of learning about Indigenous history. Ellis did an amazing job at illustrating the nuisances and complexities of settler colonialism to Native nations that we don’t typically see when learning history. She centers not only the Native nations themselves but the small ones and really distinguishes their strengths and resilience in a way that powerfully shifts the narratives we’re fed.

[Josh Reid · Rating 5 out of 5]

Outstanding research and a compelling argument -- this should reshape how we think of Indigenous polities and the historical influence they wielded. Most importantly, Ellis connects this history to issues relevant for many tribal nations today, specifically around federal recognition and visibility.

[Joey Mopsink]

Read in basically one sitting 🫠

[grace elston · Rating 3 out of 5]

holy YAWN

[Jifu · Rating 4 out of 5]

(Note: I received an advanced reader copy of this book courtesy of NetGalley)

The Great Power of Small Nations most definitely is not for those looking for a light read. However, I mean to say that in the most praiseworthy way possible. “The Great Power of Small Nations” is a remarkably well-researched, richly detailed, and resultantly engrossing overview of the Petites Nations of the Lower Mississippi. I received a top-notch introduction and education on these varied tribal nations and the incredible resilience and adaptation strategies that have allowed them to survive up through the present.