Beautifully uncontainable: of honeysuckle and Choctaw walking

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article draws connections among horticultural understanding of invasive species, phenomenological participant observation of national remembrance with the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, and historical records of mass emigration. It is about honeysuckle, walking, and Indian Removal in the United States. In thinking about mobility and Indigeneity it draws on archival records, embodied research, and lyrical theorization grounded in the posture of Performance Studies. The article weaves its analysis and theorization throughout, usually indicated by italicization, in order to mimic the experience of a thought process in motion, of walking as thinking and thinking as walking. It argues that Indigeneity belies settler colonial expectations of and desire for stasis and consistency and instead exists in the moment and through movement. Indigeneity escapes cultivation and flourishes.