The Cutting-Off Way of War
Wayne E. Lee on Indigenous Warfare in Eastern North America, 1500-1800
This is HATM's 50th episode and I wanted to do something special. This week we are joined by military historian Wayne E. Lee from the University of North Carolina to talk about The Last of the Mohicans and his new book, The Cutting-Off Way: Indigenous Warfare in Eastern North America, 1500-1800. We talk about historical misconceptions of Indigenous warfare, how warfare in the Americas compares to conflict in other parts of the globe, the beauty of North Carolina, and that waterfall scene.
Ok, so maybe Wayne isn’t a fan of the waterfall scene, but I’m definitely a fan of his. A lot of what we get into in this podcast episode are competing notions of how scholars have understood Indigenous warfare during the colonial period. There are a couple other works we speak about in particular, Patrick Malone’s The Skulking Way of War and David J. Silverman’s Thundersticks. What was really great was getting to talk to a guy who comes at Indigenous history from a military angle, as well as one of a globally comparative one. Wayne talks a lot about his experiences researching other military histories and how all of these build towards a larger product he is working on.
One other thought- I’d never met Wayne before we had this talk but man was it great to meet him. I have other friends who either know him or studied with him and every one of them RAVED about him. And it was really great to get to talk to a fellow Southerner (he’s from North Carolina and knows many of the shooting locations well). Just a great dude. I hope you like the pod. Links below.
About our guest:
Wayne Lee specializes in early modern military history, with a particular focus on North America and the Atlantic World, but he teaches military history from a full global perspective at the undergraduate and graduate level. He also teaches courses on violence as well as on the early English exploration of the Atlantic. As a kind of additional career, he works with archaeology projects in the Balkans and has numerous publications in that field. You can find him on twitter at MilHist_Lee.
This Weekend
You’ve seen the news. You know by now. But if you’re in the Denver area, come out to Wynkoop Brewing this Saturday night for a live podcast with superdupermegastar Kathleen Belew about the film Red Dawn (which is on in the background as I write this). The event is free and open to the public. Come have a drink and yell WOLVERINES!!!
HATM Sunday night
Finally, join in with us as we livetweet BlacKkKlansman (available on Netflix) on Sunday night at 8pm eastern. If you haven’t seen it, it’s actually based on a true story and is an incredible film. A Spike Lee joint.