“We Are Cherokee”: Exhibiting Material Culture as an Act of Reconciliation, a Roundtable

Abstract: In this roundtable, convened by Alaina E. Roberts, historian Julie L. Reed and two Cherokee Nation employees, Melissa Payne and Karen Shade-Lanier, discuss the groundbreaking exhibit “We Are Cherokee: Cherokee Freedmen and the Right to Citizenship.” One of the five Southeastern tribes to enslave Black women and men in the 1700s and 1800s, the Cherokees also spent decades after emancipation discriminating against their former slaves, eventually illegally disenfranchising them. “We Are Cherokee” is the first exhibit by the tribe to truly represent the humanity and marginalization of Black Cherokees. As such, the curation team faced issues around trust and transparency when soliciting objects, documents, and materials from the community. The roundtable includes information about how the curation team overcame these obstacles and how they, along with tribal leadership, see the exhibit as one part of the Cherokee Nation’s effort to acknowledge its history and work toward full incorporation of the Black Cherokees the nation once rejected.