Skip to main content
The 2023 Pulitzer Prize Finalist in History

Finalist: Seeing Red: Indigenous Land, American Expansion, and the Political Economy of Plunder in North America, by Michael John Witgen (Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture/University of North Carolina Press)

A piercing analysis of exploitative colonial arrangements made by the U.S. in the settling of the Old Northwest, and of Native resistance.

Nominated Work

Seeing Red: Indigenous Land, American Expansion, and the Political Economy of Plunder in North America

By

Michael John Witgen

 

AWARDS & DISTINCTIONS

Honorable Mention, 2023 James A. Rawley Prize, Organization of American Historians

Against long odds, the Anishinaabeg resisted removal, retaining thousands of acres of their homeland in what is now Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. Their success rested partly on their roles as sellers of natural resources and buyers of trade goods, which made them key players in the political economy of plunder that drove white settlement and U.S. development in the Old Northwest. But, as Michael Witgen demonstrates, the credit for Native persistence rested with the Anishinaabeg themselves. Outnumbering white settlers well into the nineteenth century, they leveraged their political savvy to advance a dual citizenship that enabled mixed-race tribal members to lay claim to a place in U.S. civil society. Telling the stories of mixed-race traders and missionaries, tribal leaders and territorial governors, Witgen challenges our assumptions about the inevitability of U.S. expansion. 

Deeply researched and passionately written, Seeing Red will command attention from readers who are invested in the enduring issues of equality, equity, and national belonging at its core.

Biography

Michael Witgen is a professor in the Department of History and the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race at Columbia University, and he is a citizen of the Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Ojibwe. He specializes in Indigenous and Early North American history, comparative borderlands, and the history of the early American Republic.

Winners

Prize Winner in History in 2023:

Jefferson Cowie

A resonant account of an Alabama county in the 19th and 20th centuries shaped by settler colonialism and slavery, a portrait that illustrates the evolution of white supremacy by drawing powerful connections between anti-government and racist ideologies. History

Finalists

Nominated as finalists in History in 2023:

Garrett M. Graff

A comprehensive analysis of the country’s best-known political crime, a finely-crafted synthesis of multiple sources into a comprehensive account that is engaging, humanizing and funny.

The Jury

Thavolia Glymph(Chair)

Professor of History & Law, Duke University

Elizabeth K. Hinton

Associate Professor of History & African American Studies and Professor of Law, Yale University

Jean O’Brien

Professor of History, University of Minnesota

Andrés Reséndez

Professor of History, University of California, Davis

Robert O. Self

Mary Ann Lippitt Professor of American History, Brown University

Winners in History

2022

Ada Ferrer

An original and compelling history, spanning five centuries, of the island that became an obsession for many presidents and policy makers, transforming how we think about the U.S. in Latin America, and Cuba in American society.
2021

Marcia Chatelain

A nuanced account of the complicated role the fast-food industry plays in African-American communities, a portrait of race and capitalism that masterfully illustrates how the fight for civil rights has been intertwined with the fate of Black businesses.
2020

W. Caleb McDaniel

A masterfully researched meditation on reparations based on the remarkable story of a 19th century woman who survived kidnapping and re-enslavement to sue her captor.
2019

David W. Blight

A breathtaking history that demonstrates the scope of Frederick Douglass’ influence through deep research on his writings, his intellectual evolution and his relationships.
See All History

2023 Prize Winners

Commentary

Kyle Whitmire of AL.com, Birmingham

For measured and persuasive columns that document how Alabama's Confederate heritage still colors the present with racism and exclusion, told through tours of its first capital, its mansions and monuments–and through the history that has been omitted.
Investigative Reporting

Staff of The Wall Street Journal

For sharp accountability reporting on financial conflicts of interest among officials at 50 federal agencies, revealing those who bought and sold stocks they regulated and other ethical violations by individuals charged with safeguarding the public’s interest.
See All 2023 Winners