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These Hills, This Trail: Cherokee Outdoor Historical Drama and The THESE HILLS, THIS TRAIL: CHEROKEE OUTDOOR HISTORICAL DRAMA AND THE POWER OF CHANGE/CHANGE OF POWER by CHARLES ADRON FARRIS III (Under the Direction of Marla Carlson and Jace Weaver) ABSTRACT This dissertation compares the historical development of the Cherokee Historical Association’s (CHA) Unto These Hills (1950) in Cherokee, North Carolina, and the Cherokee Heritage Center’s (CHC) The Trail of Tears (1968) in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. Unto These Hills and The Trail of Tears were originally commissioned to commemorate the survivability of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI) and the Cherokee Nation (CN) in light of nineteenth- century Euramerican acts of deracination and transculturation. Kermit Hunter, a white southern American playwright, wrote both dramas to attract tourists to the locations of two of America’s greatest events. Hunter’s scripts are littered, however, with misleading historical narratives that tend to indulge Euramerican jingoistic sympathies rather than commemorate the Cherokees’ survivability. It wasn’t until 2006/1995 that the CHA in North Carolina and the CHC in Oklahoma proactively shelved Hunter’s dramas, replacing them with historically “accurate” and culturally sensitive versions. Since the initial shelving of Hunter’s scripts, Unto These Hills and The Trail of Tears have undergone substantial changes, almost on a yearly basis. Artists have worked to correct the romanticized notions of Cherokee-Euramerican history in the dramas, replacing problematic information with more accurate and culturally specific material. Such modification has been and continues to be a tricky endeavor: the process of improvement has triggered mixed reviews from touristic audiences and from within Cherokee communities themselves. While outdoor drama is intimately linked with Euramerican touristic expectations, of which themes of faith and patriotism are most prominent, and while many outdoor dramas continue to perpetuate an out-of-date “American Imaginary,” Unto These Hills and The Trail of Tears are among the few outdoor dramas to vigorously contest, reconsider, and refigure Native American identities on the outdoor stage, as well as champion Native American sovereignty and cultural autonomy. While the CHA’s and the CHC’s outdoor dramas are dilemmatic and bound by impervious market-driven conventions, this dissertation demonstrates how the frequent revision of Unto These Hills and The Trail of Tears is better understood as an exploration of the intersections between Cherokee epistemologies and theatrical praxis. INDEX WORDS: Unto These Hills; The Trail of Tears; Kermit Hunter; Cherokee Historical Association; Cherokee Heritage Center; Outdoor Historical Drama; Mountainside Theatre; Theatre Tsa-la-gi; Cherokee Theatre and Performance; Native American; American Indian; Indigenous Theatre and Performance THESE HILLS, THIS TRAIL: CHEROKEE OUTDOOR HISTORICAL DRAMA AND THE POWER OF CHANGE/CHANGE OF POWER by CHARLES ADRON FARRIS III BA, Texas Tech University, 2005 MA, Miami University at Oxford, Ohio, 2009 A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the University of Georgia in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY ATHENS, GEORGIA 2016 © 2016 Charles Adron Farris III All Rights Reserved THESE HILLS, THIS TRAIL: CHEROKEE OUTDOOR HISTORICAL DRAMA AND THE POWER OF CHANGE/CHANGE OF POWER by CHARLES ADRON FARRIS III Major Professors: Marla Carlson Jace Weaver Committee: David Saltz Freda Scott-Giles Electronic Version Approved: Suzanne Barbour Dean of the Graduate School The University of Georgia August 2016 DEDICATION For Grey iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We are all children of somebody’s work. We may delude ourselves that we have no masters, that no personality has influenced us, proudly affirming that our originality is nourished by the anonymous and democratic teaching in the schools of our industrial civilization. Or else we can acknowledge in a few people the origin of the path that has led us to ourselves and which others call a “professional biography.” - Eugenio Barba, Land of Ashes and Diamonds Over the course of my academic adventures there have been several people that have greatly impacted my “professional biography” as a scholar and as an artist. Indeed, this dissertation is the product of not only my own experiences with the theatre, but also the experiences of those knowledgeable people that I have had the pleasure to meet, or with whom I have had the opportunity to work with and study under. Above all, my thanks go to Dr. Marla Carlson and Dr. Jace Weaver, who saw this project complete its performative arc. A number of other people have played important roles in the development of my “professional biography,” including my readers: Dr. David Saltz and Dr. Freda Scott-Giles. I also wish to thank Dr. Fran Teague, who encouraged me to travel the Trail of Tears in order to deepen my research, and who made such field research possible. In addition, I must thank the institutions who have generously supported my research through travel grants and research funding. They include: The Willson Center for Humanities & Arts, the American Society for Theatre Research (ASTR), the Graduate School and the Institute of Native American Studies at the University of Georgia. v I also wish to thank my family, my friends, and my new-found colleagues at The University of Georgia. To mention only a few: Buddy and Judy Farris, Dr. Arnab Banerji, Dr. Alicia Corts, Roy Brooks-Delphin, Angela Hall, Dr. Chris Eaket, Seth Wilson, Geoffrey Douglas, Aaron Kelly, Jieun Lee, Dr. George Pate and Libby Ricardo, Jennie Czuba, Shannon O’Neil, Kristyl Tift, and Josh Marsh. Thank you all for humoring, encouraging, and helping me along the way. Without your support, completing this project would not have been possible. Last but not least, I give special thanks to those who have given their voices to this dissertation and to the institutions who have opened their doors to me so that I could conduct research. They include: Tom Mooney, Tonia Weavel, Linda Squirrel, James Bradley, Hanay Geiogamah, The Cherokee Heritage Center, The Cherokee Historical Association, and the Institute of Outdoor Theatre. Thank you all. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .............................................................................................................v CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION .........................................................................................................1 On Epistemology ...................................................................................................10 Historical Developments of Native American Studies ..........................................17 Methodology ..........................................................................................................29 Dissertation Outline ...............................................................................................32 On Terminology and its Usage ..............................................................................34 2 THIS STORY, THEIR STORY: CHEROKEE ORIGINS AND CULTURAL FORMATIONS............................................................................................................37 Origins and Foundations ........................................................................................42 Storying the Foreign ..............................................................................................59 Conclusion .............................................................................................................91 3 THE RUDIMENTS OF UNTO THESE HILLS AND THE TRAIL OF TEARS ..........94 And so it Begins .....................................................................................................95 Unto These Hills ....................................................................................................99 The Trail of Tears ................................................................................................133 Conclusion ...........................................................................................................167 vii 4 TAKING CONTROL: COMMUNITY PRESSURES AND THEIR IMPACT ON THE LEADERSHIP OF THE CHC AND THE CHA ..............................................169 Oklahoma .............................................................................................................170 North Carolina .....................................................................................................196 Conclusion ...........................................................................................................229 5 A CLEAR ROAD FORWARD? ...............................................................................231 Under the Cherokee Moon ...................................................................................234 Legends at Dusk ...................................................................................................255 Cherokee Family Reunion....................................................................................267 Conclusion ...........................................................................................................280 6 DEFINITIVE MEMORIES: A CONCLUSION? ......................................................287 WORKS CITED ..........................................................................................................................300 WORKS CONSULTED ..............................................................................................................325
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