Professor Newson is a student of the impacts of Spanish colonization on native populaations in the Caribbean and Central America. With respect to her regional focus within Latin America, one might say that Professor Newson has directed her attention to regions that were peripheral to the primary thrusts of Spanish colonization--Trinidad, Nicaragua, and Honduras. Her work has contributed greatly to our understanding of the nature of Spanish-Indian contacts in these areas.

The Carl O. Sauer Award recognized Professsor Newson's outc;;tanding contribution to the corpus of published historical-geographic innformation on the demographic impact of the Spanish conquest and its causes. Her research has appeared in numerous journal articles pubblished in Europe, Latin America, and the Unitted States and in three books: Aboriginal and Spanish Colonial Trinidad (1976); The Cost of Conquest: Indian Decline in Honduras Under Spanish Rule (1986); and Indian survival in Colonial Nicaragua (1987).

Professor Newson's interests in the Caribbbean and her concern with the fate of the aboriginal populations of the Americas parallel the interests of Carl Sauer. Thus, it is especially fitting that she be named as a recipient of an award that perpetuates his memory.

Gary S. Elbow