The Languages and Spaces of Diplomacy in Early America, 1701 - 1774

Hatton, Heather Kathryn

Abstract

This thesis is an analysis of the nature of intercultural diplomacy, diplomats and interpolity relations in north-eastern North America between 1701 and 1774, with specific focus on British-Haudenosaunee interaction. Through the first-time juxtaposition and analysis of Conrad Weiser and Sir William Johnson’s diplomatic practice and Haudenosaunee expressions of sovereignty made during treaty councils it investigates the norms that structured intercultural diplomacy and how these were employed in the pursuit of political objectives and to articulate understandings of identity and power. Early American scholarship tends to define diplomatic interaction in this period through frames and concepts – the middle ground, the go-between and more recent paradigm legal commensurability – which emphasise cultural division and misunderstanding. This thesis departs from the idea of cultural separatism by demonstrating the fluid and intricately woven nature of intercultural relations and in doing so offers a significant reassessment of relational power dynamics and the power European diplomats possessed in early America.
Through a close, contextual reading of British-Haudenosaunee treaty council records and Weiser and Johnson’s published and private correspondence this thesis reveals that intercultural diplomacy was structured through a series of shared norms, predominantly drawn from Haudenosaunee diplomatic culture, and emergent customs that developed alongside the diplomatic relationship itself. It demonstrates that diplomats were individuals embedded within a landscape of deeply-established diplomatic norms that was also shaped by imperial competition and colonial intrusion into Indigenous spaces. In a world cross-cut with both networks of alliance and instances of conflict and tension, diplomacy and its appropriate application by diplomats provided the primary means of establishing and maintaining relations between European and Indigenous polities. Overall, rethinking the idea of diplomacy takes us closer to Indigenous understandings of treaty relationships, as living partnerships between sovereign entities and underscores the importance ongoing dialogue has always played in structuring Anglo-American-Haudenosaunee relations.

Citation

Hatton, H. K. (2020). The Languages and Spaces of Diplomacy in Early America, 1701 - 1774. (Thesis). University of Hull. https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/4922411

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: Nov 22, 2024
• Publicly Available Date: Nov 28, 2025
• Keywords: History
• Public URL: https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/4922411
• Additional Information: Department of History; University of Hull
• Award Date: Nov 20, 2020