“Three New Paradigms of Indigenous American (Re-)Discovery”

Abstract Caroline Dodds Pennock, Ned Blackhawk, and Esteban Mira Caballos published three paradigm-shifting works in 2023 that flip deeply ingrained narratives of Indigenous Americans’ presence at home in the hemispheric Americas and abroad in Europe. Pennock's book introduces scholarly shifts towards a global Indigenous presence and reframes Europe On Savage Shores where Indigenous travellers arrived on their own accord in largely forgotten encounters; Blackhawk reimagines official United States history which often omits Indigenous peoples by making them its moving force in The Rediscovery of America ; and Mira Caballos conversely breaks down stereotypical attitudes toward Indigenous travellers in Spain by evincing their transatlantic journeys to Iberia in El Descubrimiento de Europa ( The Discovery of Europe ). All three works are mutually reinforcing in their mission to dismantle popular beliefs rooted in imaginative, racist, and antiquated narratives rather than historically verified reality. They are critical for both the academic and public transformation of the history of Indigenous peoples in Northern Europe, Iberia, and the United States. They propose a necessary and well-founded revision of their respective historiographic traditions, all originating from models predicated upon the paradigm of European discovery which these authors successfully turn on its head.