Product Overview
Touchstones of Tradition:
Insights from the Material Culture of Miccosukee and Seminole People
In tribal tradition and memory, Miccosukee and Seminole people descend from renowned mound-building societies of the present day U.S. Southeast. From disparate roots, they came together at a time when colonial ambition stirred warfare and slavery, uprooting native people from their traditional homelands and threatening to remove them from their homelands and to send them to the western territories.
In this book, five scholars convey the depth and breadth of South Florida Indian creativity. Their research is inspired by objects in the Florida Museum of Natural History's Florida Ethnographic Collection and their works are complemented by over 200 figures, many in color.
Museum objects serve as reference points - touchstones - that can lead to new understandings of both past and present. Together these five chapters portray the artistic sensibilities of a proud and resilient people who justly call themselves The Unconquered.
Hardback. 11" X 8 1/2" Landscape Presentation
Chapter 1 - Sandra Starr contributes a history of turban-wearing among indigenous Americans, culminating in the practice among post-contact Creeks, Seminoles, and Miccosukees.
Chapter 2 - Brent Weisman presents a study of the clothing worn by a Seminole warrior in 1857.
Chapter 3 - Stacey Huber describes and compares two rare Seminole “long coats” from the 1820s-1840s.
Chapter 4 - Patsy West describes the development of Seminole arts through the craft guild of Edith Boehmer and the Glade Cross Mission of Harriet Bedell.
Chapter 5 - Austin Bell provides background and a classification of the iconic and beloved dolls first made to supplement income at early 20th-century “tourist camps.”
Chapter 6 - William Marquardt highlights a century of collaboration between the Florida Museum of Natural History and the Native tribes of South Florida.
Each chapter is richly illustrated and includes a bibliography. An index is provided at the end.