The Southeast Syndrome: Notes on Indian Descendant Recruitment Organizations and Their Perceptions of Native American Culture

Abstract

W HAT FOLLOWS IS NOT A SCHOLARLY disquisition in full pedagogic garb, complete with notes and bibliography. Rather, it is an informal description based on several years of direct experience as an ethnohistorian with the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Branch of Acknowledgment and Research, of a particular syndrome which is characterized, among other things, by a rapid proliferation in the southeastern United States (but not strictly limited to the Southeast). The principal reasons that this syndrome must be discussed in a general manner, without specific references, are that as a Government historian, any specific statements I might make regarding past or pending cases involving petitions for federal acknowledgment may become the subject either of litigation or allegations of pre-decisional bias, respectively. Therefore, no specific references will be made to cases I have worked on or pending cases I may work on in the future. Before I discuss the syndrome in detail, it will be useful to preface the discussion with some of the historical events which helped create the current conditions under which this syndrome was engendered and now thrives.