This dissertation explores performance as a mechanism of racialization and politicization of Native Americans in the United States. I analyze performances of Indians on theatrical stages to define how an embodied repertoire of visual, aural, and kinetic markers, what I call the Stage Indian, became codified and circulated within popular theatrical performance. I discuss Edwin Forrest’s 1829 performance of the title role in Metamora; or, The Last of the Wampanoag to show how his claims to authenticity and his depiction of Native American identity worked to codify an Indian character in American theatre. Buffalo Bill’s Wild West performance in 1886-1887 of The Drama of Civilization develops the Stage Indian further by modifying it based on the Native American performers it employed in the Indian roles and the mythic narrative of American progress it tells. The career of Will Rogers illustrates the persistence and power of the Stage Indian by showing an opposite example, a Native American who, though continually claiming Cherokee identity, was repeatedly and insistently read as white. I further explore the construction of the Indian within the United States by analyzing the creation and implementation of two landmark federal Indian laws. The 1830 Indian Removal Act and a resultant treaty, the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, demonstrate the narrow political and racial criteria the U.S. government expected from Indians as well as how Native American self-conception challenged those expectations. The 1887 General Allotment Act and records of allotment registration show how race and politics are twin foundations of Indian identity in the United States. Through my analyses of aesthetic and legal performances of Indianness I contribute to conversations of racialized performance in the United States, Native American identity, and the performativity of the law.

Last modified

• 04/15/2020

Creator

• Bethany Hughes

DOI

• https://doi.org/10.21985/n2-fsm8-7e69

Subject

• Theatre and Drama

Keyword

• Law
• Indian
• Native American
• Representation
• Performance

Date created

• 2018-01-01

Resource type

• Dissertation

Rights statement

• In Copyright