In the 1920s, the American historian Herbert Bolton began to promote the idea of a distinctive region in the United States that he called “the Spanish borderland.” That borderland, he wrote, stretched across the continent from California to Florida and included Mississippi. By asking, “How Spanish is Mississippi?” this presentation will explore how Mississippi’s Spanish past, defined by a region that encompassed the Gulf Coast and the Mississippi River, influenced African, European, and Indian people in the region. The talk will be based on the co-authored book Colonial Mississippi by Dr. Christian Pinnen and Dr. Charles Weeks.
Speakers Expertise:
Dr. Christian Pinnen is an Associate Professor in the Department of History and Political Science. Dr. Pinnen joined MC’s faculty in 2012 and currently teaches U.S. History, History of the Old South, Latin America Survey, the American Revolution, and American Slavery. His research focuses on race and slavery in the Spanish-American borderlands and capitalism in early America. He has published two books in 2019:
Complexion of Empire in Natches and
Colonial Mississippi. Dr. Pinnen is the recipient of the 2019 Humanities Teacher of the Year award and the 2024 Humanities Scholar Award. His book
Complexion of Empire in Natchez received the 2020 Best Book of the Year award from the Mississippi Historical Society.
