Tom Mould

There are thousands of books that record the oral traditions of Native peoples, documenting their myths, legends, folktales, and tribal histories. Yet, there are almost none that pay the same attention to the oral traditions that make up the other 95 percent of Native American storytelling: the personal, familial, humble stories that convey the depth of cultural knowledge, traditional practices, and lived experience of Native peoples today.Choctaw Traditions: Stories of the Life and Customs of the Mississippi Choctaw draws on over 1400 stories from interviews with over one hundred tribal members, past and present, from all of the nine Choctaw communities in Mississippi and Tennessee. This breadth creates a collection of stories capturing the rich detail and complexity of Choctaw customary life. Archival stories offer a glimpse into the past, but the vast majority of the stories were recorded over the past three decades, a collaboration between Choctaw youth, Choctaw elders, Choctaw leaders, and a folklorist.In their own words, Choctaw elders tell stories of participating in customs and traditions—stories about growing up sharecropping, where the work to put food on the table was balanced with weekends of ballgames, picnics, and dancing. They recount stories of helping each other when an iyyikowa was called to help their neighbors in need, and in gathering seasonally for ceremonies, holidays, festivals, and fundraisers. Important customs that structure lives from cradle to grave come to life through stories about the dos and don’ts of pregnancy and birth, coming of age, courtship, weddings, marriage, parenting, deaths, wakes, and funerals. With these stories, Choctaw elders offer a blueprint for how to live.

There are thousands of books that record the oral traditions of Native peoples, documenting their myths, legends, folktales, and tribal histories. Yet, there are almost none that pay the same attention to the oral traditions that make up the other 95 percent of Native American storytelling: the personal, familial, humble stories that convey the depth of cultural knowledge, traditional practices, and lived experience of Native peoples today.Choctaw Traditions: Stories of the Life and Customs of the Mississippi Choctaw draws on over 1400 stories from interviews with over one hundred tribal members, past and present, from all of the nine Choctaw communities in Mississippi and Tennessee. This breadth creates a collection of stories capturing the rich detail and complexity of Choctaw customary life. Archival stories offer a glimpse into the past, but the vast majority of the stories were recorded over the past three decades, a collaboration between Choctaw youth, Choctaw elders, Choctaw leaders, and a folklorist.In their own words, Choctaw elders tell stories of participating in customs and traditions—stories about growing up sharecropping, where the work to put food on the table was balanced with weekends of ballgames, picnics, and dancing. They recount stories of helping each other when an iyyikowa was called to help their neighbors in need, and in gathering seasonally for ceremonies, holidays, festivals, and fundraisers. Important customs that structure lives from cradle to grave come to life through stories about the dos and don’ts of pregnancy and birth, coming of age, courtship, weddings, marriage, parenting, deaths, wakes, and funerals. With these stories, Choctaw elders offer a blueprint for how to live.

From the earliest stories recorded among the Choctaw in the 1700s to the most recent stories being told today, Choctaw Tales: Stories from the Firekeepers amasses the most comprehensive collection of oral traditions of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians ever published. Originally published in 2004, Choctaw Tales was a celebration of the art of storytelling, including myths, legends, supernatural tales, prophecies, historical anecdotes, tall tales, and animal stories. Through these stories, which include fifty new stories in this edition, Choctaw narrators create, express, and negotiate their beliefs, values, humor, and life experiences, as well as those of their ancestors before them. Their stories display the intelligence, artistry, and creativity of storytellers past and present. Choctaw Tales includes new and expanded materials to keep this valued resource current. Nestled in the middle of Mississippi woodlands, the Choctaw have long been an elusive community to outsiders. Racial prejudice and historical mistreatment made the Choctaw wary of their neighbors. Many of their stories address this tension, both subtly and boldly. Virtually all the stories tackle either cosmological, historical, relational, or personal questions about the world and its inhabitants, offering complex responses in the guise of seemingly simple stories. For the Choctaw audience, the stories often need little explanation. However, a series of essays on Choctaw storytelling, coupled with careful annotation of each story and short biographies of each storyteller, help make this vibrant oral tradition understandable to today’s general audiences.

From the earliest stories recorded among the Choctaw in the 1700s to the most recent stories being told today, Choctaw Tales: Stories from the Firekeepers amasses the most comprehensive collection of oral traditions of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians ever published. Originally published in 2004, Choctaw Tales was a celebration of the art of storytelling, including myths, legends, supernatural tales, prophecies, historical anecdotes, tall tales, and animal stories. Through these stories, which include fifty new stories in this edition, Choctaw narrators create, express, and negotiate their beliefs, values, humor, and life experiences, as well as those of their ancestors before them. Their stories display the intelligence, artistry, and creativity of storytellers past and present. Choctaw Tales includes new and expanded materials to keep this valued resource current. Nestled in the middle of Mississippi woodlands, the Choctaw have long been an elusive community to outsiders. Racial prejudice and historical mistreatment made the Choctaw wary of their neighbors. Many of their stories address this tension, both subtly and boldly. Virtually all the stories tackle either cosmological, historical, relational, or personal questions about the world and its inhabitants, offering complex responses in the guise of seemingly simple stories. For the Choctaw audience, the stories often need little explanation. However, a series of essays on Choctaw storytelling, coupled with careful annotation of each story and short biographies of each storyteller, help make this vibrant oral tradition understandable to today’s general audiences.

In 1976, Ronald Reagan hit the campaign trail with an extraordinary account of a woman committing massive welfare fraud. The story caught fire and a devastating symbol of the misuse government programs was born: the Welfare Queen. Overthrowing the Queen examines these legends of fraud and abuse while bringing to light personal stories of hardship and hope told by cashiers, bus drivers, and business owners; politicians and aid providers; and, most important, aid recipients themselves. Together these stories reveal how the seemingly innocent act of storytelling can create not only powerful stereotypes that shape public policy, but also redemptive counter-narratives that offer hope of a more accurate, fair, and empathetic view of poverty in America today. Overthrowing the Queen tackles perceptions of welfare recipients while proposing new approaches to the study of oral narrative that extend far beyond the study of welfare, poverty, and social justice.

In 1976, Ronald Reagan hit the campaign trail with an extraordinary account of a woman committing massive welfare fraud. The story caught fire and a devastating symbol of the misuse government programs was born: the Welfare Queen. Overthrowing the Queen examines these legends of fraud and abuse while bringing to light personal stories of hardship and hope told by cashiers, bus drivers, and business owners; politicians and aid providers; and, most important, aid recipients themselves. Together these stories reveal how the seemingly innocent act of storytelling can create not only powerful stereotypes that shape public policy, but also redemptive counter-narratives that offer hope of a more accurate, fair, and empathetic view of poverty in America today. Overthrowing the Queen tackles perceptions of welfare recipients while proposing new approaches to the study of oral narrative that extend far beyond the study of welfare, poverty, and social justice.

This intriguing study explores the power and artistry of prophecy among the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians, who use predictions about the future to interpret the world around them. This book challenges the common assumption that American Indian prophecy was an anomaly of the 18th and 19th centuries that resulted from tribes across the continent reacting to the European invasion. Tom Mould's study of the contemporary prophetic traditions of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians reveals a much larger system of prophecy that continues today as a vibrant part of the oral tradition. Mould shows that Choctaw prophecy is more than a prediction of the future: it is a way to unite the past, present, and future in a moral dialogue about how one should live. Choctaw prophecy, he argues, is stable and continuous; it is shared in verbal discourse, inviting negotiation on the individual level; and, because it is a tradition of all the people, it manifests itself through myriad visions with many themes. In homes, casinos, restaurants, laundromats, day care centers, and grocery stores, as well as in ceremonial and political situations, people discuss current events and put them into context with traditional stories that govern the culture. In short, recitation is widely used in everyday life as a way to interpret, validate, challenge, and create the world of the Choctaw speaker. Choctaw Prophecy stands as a sound model for further study into the prophetic traditions of not only other American Indian tribes but also communities throughout the world. Weaving folklore and oral tradition with ethnography, this book will be useful to academic and public libraries as well as to scholars and students of southern Indians and the modern South.