Mapping the Homelands: A Collaborative Effort of Auburn University, the National Park Service, and Native American Tribes

Summary

Native American land ownership underwent significant geographic changes following European settlement. This intensified after the American Revolution due to demographic changes, tribal migration, and aggressive Euro-American expansion. This paper presents the results of a collaboration between Auburn University, the National Park Service, and federally recognized tribes to plot land loss from ca. 1790 through the 1850s, with particular emphasis on the impact of the War of 1812 on native landholding. The historical and cartographic work combined ethnohistorical data collection with GIS methodology, and resulted in a series of maps showing the locations of federally recognized tribal groups through time. This project is unique in including consultation with Native American tribes. The final result is a dynamic, interactive, and user-friendly online database of tribal land tracts that is accessible to the public on the NPS.gov website. This paper will examine the process and challenges of creating a digital database of land loss for fifty-four tribes across four distinct time periods.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage