Arts and Humanities Commons^™

The Isleño Décima: Media And Memory In Spanish-Speaking South Louisiana, Jeanne Gillespie

JEANNE GILLESPIE

From the early fifteenth century to the end of the eighteenth century, the Spanish colonial process involved the settling of vast tracks of land. From their first colonial experiment in the Canary Islands in 1402, the Spanish administration learned that it was sometimes more effective to import assimilated settlers from already established colonial possessions than to attempt massive conversion and cultural assimilation. To shore up the vast spaces of the northern Gulf Coast, particularly "West Florida" and eastern Texas, the Spanish governors sent for colonists including groups of Canary Islanders who settled outposts along the Red River, as well as …