Since I couldn't go in and use my campus computer, I decided to take the day and go to the Choctaw Cultural Center in my town. I had been to the cafe there a couple times, and I've done fieldwork in the prairie, but I had never been to the museums/displays.
I got the "educator's discount." It's not expensive for what's there, but the man at the desk asked me the various things (did I have a CDIB card, and no, you can't always tell if someone is Native without asking) and when he asked if I was a teacher I said "Well, I'm a biology professor..." and he said "That counts" (Professors make more than public school teachers so I wondered if *ethically* I was entitled to the discount). The woman working with him piped up: "I knew it! You have a professor 'vibe'" which is funny to me because several people who didn't know me in several situations (e.g., an Amtrak sleeping car attendant) have asked me "are you a professor" and I'm not quite sure how they clock me as that, whether it's how I speak or how I carry myself, or what.
I had been told that "plan on spending several hours" and yes, it is a very complete museum, and there's a LOT to see - I admit I kind of went fast through the most modern stuff and the "rotating display" (On a big Labor Day celebration they do, which is like a fair) because I was getting tired.
My favorite part was the really early history stuff. Anthropologically and culturally, the Choctaw are related to the Eastern Woodland tribes; they consider the area around Moundville, Alabama their ancestral home. There's a relief map showing a reconstruction of the mounds, and there's a re-creation of an ancient dwelling, and that was really interesting to see. (I've been up to Spiro Mounds; I think that was a slightly different group but there are some similarities). There's also a big display on agriculture - a special variety of corn, and a squash called sweet potato squash, and beans, and sunflower, and I might be forgetting a fifth crop that was grown? But I am interested in how people hundreds of years ago - or a thousand years ago - not living in an urbanized area, lived.
It was very much a matrilineal society; women owned the houses, and they did most of the farming while the men mostly went out to hunt. The children stayed with the women and helped farm; the old people did too if they were able. It was a more communal society, which may be an important point for "how did people survive" - sharing the labor in something like a subsistence farming situation is going to be pretty necessary (and not paying too much attention to "hey that person is injured and can't quite pull their weight" and maybe feed them less, like might happen in modern America)
There was a set up with three of the origin stories - two legends, and one based on archaeology. It was in a constructed cave that had different chambers you walked into. There were "handprints" you pressed to see and hear the origin story. It was very dim and I found it disorienting, but not in an unpleasant way; I think it was more memorable like that.
Then the flow of the rooms took you to the broken treaties, and how the early colonists (Yes, Jefferson, too) wanted to try to get the land that the Choctaw and other people had lived on since time immemorial (I think because this was the tribe's work, and not the state government, or European Americans, it was less whitewashed). And there was a lot on what most people call the Trail of Tears (but they made a point one of the leaders actually called it "The Trail of Tears and Death"). They had winter wind audio playing in that room and that added to the emotion of what you were reading and seeing. (And I didn't know: in the early 1900s there were MORE removals, of people who had stayed back in Alabama, and apparently they were essentially sold into slavery for farming cotton. And the people were stuffed into cattle cars on a train to be taken from Alabama to here, and as someone who learned about the Holocaust in sixth grade and remembers hearing about the boxcars, that sent a shiver down my spine).
It's not happy to realize my nation did this. But we did.
I had to tap out partway through that - it was 1 pm and I needed to eat, and also, I think I was having a hard time reading the accounts, because again: seeing a rise in more open cruelty right now makes me feel like we're sliding hard and fast down a slope, and there's not really anything I can do to stop it.
So a break was necessary.
I went to the cafe. They have a number of Choctaw-inspired dishes (as well as more mundane fare, but I figure: if there's something I can eat and think I'll like among the less usual things, get that). I had had their "Chata Plate" (grilled pork, pinto beans, and a cornmeal bread called banaha bread, which is like an unfilled tamale) before, and I liked it, and while I also liked the Indian Taco they have, it's a LOT more food, and I wanted not to be immobilized after the meal
The first time I had this I wasn't sure I liked the banaha bread (I think I was expecting something different) but it does grow on you. This one is plain but I guess traditionally in families, it's served with drippings or gravy or bacon grease. It's fine plain, too.
The pork is VERY good. I think the guy who worked for the center, who helped us on some of the prairie stuff, mentioned they had farmers who specifically raised pigs for the dishes. (So much grocery store pork is simply not good, so I don't buy it). The beans were very good, too - seasoned just right, and anyway, I like pinto beans.
The Choctaws of course have the casino with fancy restaurants, so I suppose they have the same commissaries. The food at the cafe is very reasonable - I paid $11 for this plate lunch, and another $3 for a (real) lemonade.
After lunch, I went back and finished the history from about 1830 on. The more "modern" part (early 1900s/mid 1900s) was interesting, too - they reference the residential schools (which seem not to have been quite as bad as what I've read about some of the ones that were in Canada, though kids did get punished for speaking Choctaw - back then I guess people didn't understand that being bilingual is actually good for brain development, and anyway, people should be free to keep their original language as they learn a new one)
There was also mention of faith. Most Choctaw people now are Christian, and several places it's said they "embraced" Christianity when they heard about it (I'm going to accept that at face value; a couple people who spoke said that it didn't seem that different from the beliefs they were following, at least in terms of monotheism, at the time of contact). There's a small replica of a church/chapel that shows a short movie about worship in the modern Choctaw people; it's very much like any Protestant service, except some of the singing is in Choctaw; they had a version of Amazing Grace and another that sounded like it was the same tune as Star in the East , an old shape-note hymn. (It's possible they learned the tune when they lived in Alabama; I think there was that style of singing there). And they showed a potluck at one church and I nodded - there were some different foods, but other than that it was very like the potlucks at my church, and that made me happy.
There was also a set up of a couple rooms of a "modern" house (a living room and a tiny kitchen, and again, I smiled when I saw the "cornflower blue" pattern Corningware in the open cupboard; my mom had some of that. They also showed the little kitchen garden (Maybe the fifth crop I was forgetting before was lamb's quarters? Some people STILL grow that; you can cook it like spinach)
I admit I kind of sped through the last display about the "Labor Day" celebrations because I was getting tired and did want to stop off at the gift shop.
They had a very nice large book on Choctaw foodways by the man there that I know, but it was $80 and that's not quite in my budget right now. But I did buy a little beading kit:
I also asked for several quarters in my change as they had a penny-smasher machine (I knew I had a penny in my purse). I like those things but I wonder if they'll start to be taken out of service as pennies become less and less circulated. (They didn't exist when I was a kid and I wonder if they did if my parents would have indulged me in wanting to use them, or if they'd have felt I was "wasting" my money. But I like them, and they're a cheap fun souvenir that doesn't take up much space).
It didn't photograph well, but it's a tortoise (an animal that features in a lot of the legends). There were four choices and that was my favorite.
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