Amanda Thompson

The characteristic patchwork made by the Native Florida Seminole and Miccosukee peoples emerged as an art form in the early twentieth century at a time of heightened settler colonial impact on Seminole life ways. Makers crafted patchwork in response to the opportunities and limitations created under these conditions. Non-Native materials and technologies enabled the form just as imposed ecological change disrupted subsistence practices and legal restrictions limited economic engagement. As patchwork became a central aspect of Seminole cultural distinction, Seminole women identified the economic potential in its demonstration to and consumption by outsiders in the burgeoning tourist economy of southern Florida.

Patchwork has since been the focus of tourist attractions, missionization efforts, Bureau of Indian Affairs development schemes, and appropriation by settler hobbyist crafters and fashion designers. Examining the role of patchwork in the intercultural contexts of tourism, development, and appropriation, my research aims to understand how and why patchwork functions as a cultural mediator in settler colonial encounters. My project has two primary, interrelated arguments: that patchwork has been a site of Native agency in adaptation to the impacts of settler colonialism; and that the conceived correlation of Seminole patchwork to settler craft traditions both enabled the movement of patchwork in these contexts and made patchwork a site of negotiation for Native-settler relations. By seeking to understand the relationship between the reception of Native making and the discourses of settler craft traditions, I work to remedy the historical isolation of these two topics and identify how the dynamics of settler colonialism have conditioned the critical history of craft in the United States and marginalized Native cultural expressions.