Enrolling as Cherokee Freedmen: Social Networks of Rejected Applicants

Abstract

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Cherokee Freedmen—the people of African descent formerly enslaved by the Cherokees—and their descendants were required to apply for enrollment on Cherokee census rolls, administered by the United States, to receive land allotments, annuities, and benefits as Cherokee citizens. A chronological examination of the lives of rejected Freedmen applicants through their interview transcripts, combined with a non-linear visualization of their social networks, this project revitalizes the rejected Cherokee Freedmen applicants who are multiply marginalized from the Cherokee Nation, the United States, and the Cherokee Freedmen community. This visualization further aims to offer a less hierarchical experience of digitized archival materials. This project also explores the goals, process, and limitations of the Cherokee census rolls to contextualize how the Cherokee Freedmen status has been determined by a particular racial, economic, and bureaucratic dynamics within the Cherokee Nation.History of Black Writing’s Black Book Interactive Project (BBIP) Digital Publishing Scholars ProgramNEH Digital Humanities Advancement GrantAfrican American Studies Publishing Without Walls 2 (AFRO-PWW 2) at the University of Illinoi