Explore Indigenous experiences from the pre-colonial period through the present, in the region known as the U. S. South.
This page is broken into the following categories:
Historical Overviews:
The Columbia Guide to American Indians of the Southeast by
Chapter 1, “Writing About Native Southerners,” is a brief introduction to the ways scholars have researched the many eras of Native peoples. Chapter 2, “Native Southerners” (20-33) spans the very long period of time before the shorter eras covered in the next 5 chapters (“European Invasion,” “Native Peoples and Colonial Empires,” “‘Civilization’ and Removal,” “Native Southerners in the West,” “Those Who Remained.”) Part II is “People, Places, Events, A-Z,” short entries organized alphabetically; Part II is “Chronology” (15 pp), and Part IV is “Resources.”
Handbook of North American Indians by
As a whole, this collection provides basic information about the various indigenous populations of North America. (The volume on the Northeast was published in the mid 1970s but it is still a great starting point for research.) Each entry is written by an authority in the field. This collection provides a whole lot of info (you can even find the different names that have been associated with each community over time). This collection is also chronologically broader than the works by Parades and Williams.
The Southeastern Indians by
Hudson’s work is both historical and anthropological. He starts with pre-contact history and then provides a panorama of southern Mississippian culture at the time of contact.
Historical Sources by Time Period:
Native Southerners: Indigenous History from Origins to Removal by
Publisher describes this as “a sweeping narrative of American Indian history in the Southeast from the time before European colonialism to the Trail of Tears and beyond. In the Native South, as in much of North America, storytelling is key to an understanding of origins and tradition--and the stories of the indigenous people of the Southeast are central to Native Southerners. Spanning territory reaching from modern-day Louisiana and Arkansas to the Atlantic coast, and from present-day Tennessee and Kentucky through Florida, this book gives voice to the lived history of such well-known polities as the Cherokees, Creeks, Seminoles, Chickasaws, and Choctaws, as well as smaller Native communities like the Nottoway, Occaneechi, Haliwa-Saponi, Catawba, Biloxi-Chitimacha, Natchez, Caddo, and many others.” This 2019 book contains a very useful, detailed bibliography.
Southeastern Indians since the Removal Era by
“Southeastern Indians Before Removal: Prehistory, Contact, Decline” pp 3-24, is Williams’s 1979 overview of this long time span. The rest of the book is in 3 sections. Section I is “Native Groups that Avoided Removal,” with essays on “The Indians of Virginia,” the NC Lumbees, the LA Tunica Indians, the Houma Indians of Southeastern Louisiana, and the Catawba Indians of South Carolina. Part II, “Remnants of Removed Nations,” covers Indians in Alabama (Creek), Mississippi (Choctaw), North Carolina (Eastern Band of Cherokees) and Florida (Seminole). The final section is Williams’s conclusion, “Patterns in the History of the Remaining Southeastern Indians, 1840-1975,” followed by a “Bibliographic Essay” on useful sources (as of 1979).
Indians of the Southeastern United States in the Late Twentieth Century by
Particularly relevant chapters are “Contemporary Native Americans in South Carolina“ and “Overview of Southeastern Indian Tribes Today.” Although this resource is now 30 years old, it could be valuable to compare the state of SC Indian Tribes in 1992 with current conditions.
Focused Scholarly Studies
The Native South: New Histories and Enduring Legacies by
Collection of essays by scholars who were all doctoral students of Theda Purdue and Michael Green, leading scholars on Native Americans in the South. They used an ethnohistorical approach, combining the methods of cultural anthropology and history with “the perspectives and historical understandings of Native people.” The introduction states, “Green and Perdue promoted research on the Native South that placed Indian people at the center of their own history, and they encouraged their students to seek new narratives about what southern history means with Native people restored to a prominent place in that narrative.” This book does not contain specific information on Native people of South Carolina.
The Indian Slave Trade: The Rise of the English Empire in the American South 1670-1717. by
This book is the first ever to focus on the traffic in Indian slaves during the early years of the American South. The Indian slave trade was of central importance from the Carolina coast to the Mississippi Valley for nearly fifty years, linking southern lives and creating a whirlwind of violence and profit-making. Gallay documents how the trade operated, the processes by which Europeans and Native Americans became participants, and the profound consequences for the South and its peoples.
The Yamasee War: A Study of Culture, Economy, and Conflict in the Colonial South by
Between 1715 and 1718, an alliance of southeastern Indian groups orchestrated attacks across South Carolina, killing more than 400 British settlers, and transforming the southern political landscape for the remainder of the eighteenth century. Simultaneously, local Native communities were involved in South Carolina’s commodity and Indian slave trade. This is the only monograph that examines the causes, tactics, and effects of the Yamasee War, while considering Native participation in transatlantic commerce.
The People Who Stayed: Southeastern Indian Writing After Removal. by
An anthology of writing by Native people, including fiction, poetry, drama, memoir, journalism, and work published online. The lead editor, Geary Hobson, born in Arkansas, identifies as Cherokee–Arkansas Quapaw. The introduction,“The South Seldom Seen,” pp 1-20, provides a readable overview of the vast histories that preceded removal as well as the written texts and oral histories presented in the book. The rest of the book is divided by sub-regions, providing texts in chronological order by people who are members of the tribes whose homes were in these parts of the Southeast. Part I is “Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware,” Part II (the longest) is “Carolinas, Tennessee, and Kentucky,” Part III is “Deep South: Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi,” and Part IV is “Arkansas, Louisiana, and East Texas.”
The Lives in Objects: Native Americans, British Colonists, and Cultures of Labor and Exchange in the Southeast by
This monograph considers the deerskin trade in the colonial Southeast, with attention to British American and Southeastern Indian cultures of production, distribution, and consumption. Stern shows how Southeastern Indian and British American actors mixed gift giving and commodity exchange in the deerskin trade, such that Southeastern Indians retained much greater agency as producers and consumers than the standard narratives allow. Stern also demonstrates that concepts of labor, commerce, and material culture were inextricably intertwined to present a fresh perspective on trade in the colonial Southeast.
We Will Always Be Here by
“First-hand views from current tribal leaders and activists who are on the front lines of modern debates over identity and sovereignty.”
The People Who Stayed: Southeastern Indian Writing After Removal. by
An anthology of writing by Native people, including fiction, poetry, drama, memoir, journalism, and work published online. The lead editor, Geary Hobson, born in Arkansas, identifies as Cherokee–Arkansas Quapaw. The introduction,“The South Seldom Seen,” pp 1-20, provides a readable overview of the vast histories that preceded removal as well as the written texts and oral histories presented in the book. The rest of the book is divided by sub-regions, providing texts in chronological order by people who are members of the tribes whose homes were in these parts of the Southeast. Part I is “Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware,” Part II (the longest) is “Carolinas, Tennessee, and Kentucky,” Part III is “Deep South: Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi,” and Part IV is “Arkansas, Louisiana, and East Texas.”
