Biography

I am a PhD candidate in History and an oral history volunteer with the Seminole Indian Scouts Cemetery Association. I received my MA in History from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette in 2021. Working in close collaboration with Black Seminole community members from Texas and Coahuila, my research examines the contested representation and frequent erasure of Black Seminoles. I employ a transnational reading and listening practice that engages archival materials, published works, and oral accounts from Mexico and the United States. Using English, Spanish, and Afro-Seminole Creole, I have collected in-depth oral accounts from a range of community members from the Texas-Coahuila borderlands since 2021, primarily women and community elders. Drawing on contemporary oral accounts of Black Seminoles, WPA “slave narratives,” and transcripts of accounts from previous research, I explore the tension between lived experiences of Black Seminoles and representations of their lives and histories found in songs, films, children’s books, paintings, stage plays, school curricula, museum exhibits, tourism materials, public monuments, and government documents since the mid-nineteenth century. To better understand Black Seminole lived experiences over time, I also consider a wide range of archival and non-archival evidence, such as architecture, foodways, music, artistic expression, and linguistic development/revitalization.