Crossing Waters, Crossing Worlds

by Miles, Tiya; Holland, Sharon Patricia

• ISBN13: 9780822338659
• ISBN10: 0822338653
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2006-10-30
• Publisher: Duke Univ Pr

Summary

Crossing Waters, Crossing Worldsexplores the critically neglected intersection of Native and African American cultures. This interdisciplinary collection combines historical studies of the complex relations between blacks and Indians in Native communities with considerations and examples of various forms of cultural expression that have emerged from their intertwined histories. The eighteen contributors include scholars of African American and Native American studies, English, history, anthropology, law, and performance studies, as well as fiction writers, poets, and a visual artist. Essays range from a close reading of the 1838 memoirs of a black and Native freewoman to an analysis of how Afro-Native intermarriage has impacted the identities and federal government classifications of certain New England Indian tribes. One contributor explores the aftermath of black slavery in the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations, highlighting issues of culture and citizenship. Another scrutinizes the controversy that followed the 1998 selection of a Miss Navajo who had an African American father. An historian examines the status of Afro-Indians in colonial Mexico, and an ethnographer reflects on oral histories gathered from Afro-Choctaws.Crossing Waters, Crossing Worldsincludes evocative readings of several of Toni Morrison's novels, interpretations of plays by African American and First Nations playwrights, an original short story by Roberta Hill, and an interview with the Creek poet and musician Joy Harjo. The Native American scholar Robert Warrior develops a theoretical model for comparative work though an analysis of black and Native intellectual production. In his afterword, he reflects on the importance of the critical project advanced by this volume.

Table of Contents

Foreword: ``Not Recognized by the Tribe''	ix
Sharon P. Holland
Preface: Eating out of the Same Pot?	xv
Tiya Miles
Acknowledgments	xix
Introduction: Crossing Waters, Crossing Worlds	1	(24)
Tiya Miles
Sharon P. Holland
A Harbor of Sense: An Interview with Joy Harjo	25	(6)
Eugene B. Redmond
An / Other Case of New England Underwriting: Negotiating Race and Property in Memoirs of Elleanor Eldridge	31	(26)
Jennifer D. Brody
Sharon P. Holland
Race and Federal Recognition in Native New England	57	(23)
Tiffany M. McKinney
Where Will the Nation Be at Home? Race, Nationalisms, and Emigration Movements in the Creek Nation	80	(20)
David A. Y. O. Chang
In Their ``Native Country'': Freedpeople's Understandings of Culture and Citizenship in the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations	100	(21)
Barbara Krauthamer
``Blood and Money'': The Case of Seminole Freedmen and Seminole Indians in Oklahoma	121	(24)
Melinda Micco
``Playing Indian''? The Selection of Radmilla Cody as Miss Navajo Nation, 1997--1998	145	(19)
Celia E. Naylor
``Their Hair was Curly'': Afro-Mexicans in Indian Villages, Central Mexico, 1700--1820	164	(17)
Deborah E. Kanter
Lone Wolf and Du Bois for a New Century: Intersections of Native American and African American Literatures	181	(15)
Robert Warrior
Native Americans, African Americans, and the Space That Is America: Indian Presence in the Fiction of Toni Morrison	196	(22)
Virginia Kennedy
Knowing All of My Names	218	(8)
Tamara Buffalo
After the Death of the Last: Performance as History in Monique Mojica's Princess Pocahontas and The Blue Spots	226	(34)
Wendy S. Walters
Katimih o Sa Chata Kiyou (Why Am I Not Choctaw)? Race in the Lived Experiences of Two Black Choctaw Mixed-Bloods	260	(13)
Robert Keith Collins
From Ocean to O-Shen: Reggae, Rap, and Hip Hop in Hawai'i	273	(36)
Ku'ualoha Ho'omanawanui
Heartbreak	309	(12)
Roberta J. Hill
Afterword	321	(6)
Robert Warrior
References	327	(18)
Contributors	345