Multi-Plied Research Methods: Choctaw Traditional Textiles and Collaborative Research on Southeast Fibers, Cordage, and Garments

Summary

This is an abstract from the "The Ties That Bind: Cordage, Its Sources, and the Artifacts of Its Creation and Use" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Since 2018, the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma Historic Preservation department has worked to reawaken pre-European contact knowledge of fiber technologies. Drawing on archaeological and ethnographic sources, this applied archaeology work is approached through both collaborative models of research and experimentation and community engagement. This presentation will discuss ways that communities, in this case the Choctaw Traditional Textile group, can engage with past perishable technologies through the act of making and studying extant materials alongside others in both hands-on and virtual engagements (i.e., Zoom). The Choctaw Nation Cultural Center, opened in 2021, provided an opportunity for Choctaw makers to learn and apply textile techniques including cordage production and twining to contribute to diorama exhibits. Through an iterative process, the Choctaw Traditional Textiles group has continued to refine material processing and cordage preparation techniques by engaging with extant collections and experimentation with fiber sources. This process has expanded our ability to represent and educate on the textile traditions of ancestral makers while empowering Choctaw artists and rebuilding connections to Choctaw homelands through engagement with native fibers. Finally, this applied work informs broader academic and museum archaeology fields through the presenter’s dissertation research design and data collection on extant cordage and textile materials.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• The Ties That Bind: Cordage, Its Sources, and the Artifacts of Its Creation and Use   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 40416.0