| My research is focused on the late seventeenth and eighteenth century North American southeast and its place in Atlantic world. Specifically, I explore the way in which members of the British and Cherokee nations understood space, both physically and intellectually, during the colonial period. To do this I explore what I define as spatial personas, that is, the linkage of a person's identification with a specific location, or locations, as a means of verifying identity and informing the act of contact.;Beginning in Britain, I explore physical incidents such as the rebuilding of London after the Great Fire, land enclosure, and landscape design, alongside intellectual developments such as the enactment of new laws, the writings of John Locke and Daniel Defoe, to unpack the components of a British spatial persona. I follow a similar approach for the Cherokee where I look at structural design and spatial distribution through archaeology and analyze the many legends and myths of the Cherokee to uncover a Cherokee spatial persona. Once both these spatial personas have been uncovered I apply them to a number of specific events to plot the influence of space during colonial contact. |
