"The Strict Ties and Voice of Nature": Coosaponakeesa's Transatlantic "Tribalography"

Abstract: This essay responds to Graeber and Wengrow's Indigenous critique, arguing that Indigenous subjects' challenges to colonial power do not necessarily approach these dialogues in the same terms that their European counterparts do. It uses Choctaw scholar LeAnne Howe's concept of "tribalography" to articulate this profound difference and takes as an example the writings of Anglo-Muscogee trader Coosaponakeesa (Mary Musgrove). Comparing two memorial statements composed at the beginning and at the end of her 1754-55 journey to London to appeal for land claims, it analyzes the editorial choices she made as impacted by her increased knowledge of English culture. Tribalography reveals that her Coosaponakeesa's rhetoric is not merely canny but also operates as a performance shaping a common understanding of relations between people through story. Academic engagement with the Indigenous critique should acknowledge and work to account for such epistemological differences at play in records of encounter within archives of colonial exchange.