He specializes in Native American history, especially of the
Upper Midwest and
Great Lakes region of North America. His 2022 book
Seeing Red: Indigenous Land, American Expansion, and the Political Economy of Plunder in North America details the political and economic pressures that led to the
Anishinaabe and other Native peoples becoming dispossessed of their lands during the 18th and 19th centuries. However, Witgen's research challenges the misconception that the Native Peoples of North America quickly became overwhelmed and displaced by White settlers. Witgen explains how the Anishinaabeg peoples used their greater numbers, access to natural resources, and political maneuvering to keep most of their lands well into the 19th century. The book was a finalist for the
Pulitzer Prize for History in 2023.
Seeing Red was reviewed in the
New York Review of Books by
Francisco Cantu who described the work as "neither a popular history nor a polemic, offering instead a deeply researched look at the ideological and legal foundations of the systems that have despoiled Native nations." Cantu states that Witgen joined a new school of historians who challenged the myth that Native Peoples in North American were quickly conquered during American westward expansion, in fact Witgen's works focus on Native American resilience and adaptability in the face of an encroaching American political and military system. The book was also awarded the
Organization of American Historians James A. Rawley Prize and the
Western History Association's
Caughey Western History Association Prize for the best history book about the American West. Witgen's first book,
An Infinity of Nations: How the Native New World Shaped Early North America explains how Native Peoples formed a "Native New World", retaining their culture, society, political system, economy well into European colonization of the East Coast. They successfully resisted forced assimilation but also joined the world economy. Witgen's study focuses on the
Anishinaabe and
Dakota peoples to document this cultural shift. == References ==