Legislating Women's Sexuality: Cherokee Marriage Laws in the Nineteenth Century

Yarbrough, Fay A.

doi:10.1353/jsh.2004.0144

Cited by 19 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…Interracial marriages most frequently occurred between Cherokee women and white men (Yarbrough 2004). 9 The reasons for a greater share of Cherokee women willing to marry outside of the tribe are somewhat under-researched.…”

Section: Historical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Race and agriculture during the assimilation era: Evidence from the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians

Gregg¹,

Miller²

2022

DemRes

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BACKGROUNDThe role of race within tribal communities is a contentious topic, and some of this acrimony emerged from 19th-century Indian policies rooted in scientific racism. There has been relatively little written on the role of intermarriage within indigenous communities. METHODSWe link household data from the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in North Carolina at the turn of the 20th century to individual two-generational family trees located in legal documents to investigate the link between personal property and whether a household head had white ancestry. RESULTSWe find that the racial gap in property does not follow simple racial hierarchies but rather depends on the gender of the household head. However, once selection into intermarriage is accounted for, the racial gap in property from intermarriage is eliminated. In fact, households containing a male head with close white ancestors held less property than households containing a male head without white ancestry. CONTRIBUTIONUnderstanding who chose to intermarry and how intermarriages impacted the economic status of both families and their children as adults can provide key insights into understanding racial inequality today.1 The analysis and conclusions set forth here do not reflect the opinions of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis or its board of governors.

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Section: Historical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Race and agriculture during the assimilation era: Evidence from the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians

Gregg¹,

Miller²

2022

DemRes

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…As such, Cherokee and Choctaw offi cials were redefi ning their own nations racially and used marriage laws to write and reinforce this new defi nition. 32 Although scholars agree that the growing population of biracial children that resulted from these intermarriages was signifi cant, particularly by the nineteenth century, little agreement over how biracial people thought of themselves or their overall role in their societies has emerged. Claudio Saunt has argued that the substantial "mestizo" population that evolved in the Creek nation by the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century was largely disruptive.…”

Section: Michelle Lemastermentioning

confidence: 99%