Towards a revision of the history of Southern Plains-New Mexico relations: Lipan Apaches and Southern Plains ecology, 1500-1720

This study argues that the history of the sixteenth and seventeenth century Southern Plains-New Mexico region can be significantly revised if approached from an epistemology founded on William James\u27s doctrine of radical empiricism. Such an epistemology seeks out empirical data and interpretations of that data from a variety of disciplines, and by casting a wider net, empirically and metahistorically, provides for a more true conception of the past. It is argued that previous interpretations of this history have missed a larger understanding of changes occurring in the region due to a variety of limiting perspectives, which has included interpretations imbued with presentist, teleological, ethnocentric, or anthropocentric epistemologies. Focusing on the Lipan Apaches, this study uses historical documents, interpretations, and data amassed from anthropology and the natural sciences to reconstruct a more rich, full, and inclusive history of the region