From Vol. 90, Ed. 08 May 2, 2024
Three Western Carolina University professors discussed the university’s complex relationship with the land it occupies at the “Beneath Our Feet” history and archeology panel April 2.
Dr. Andrew Denson, Dr. Jane Eastman and Dr. Brett Riggs each spoke on their area of expertise in Cherokee archeology and history on WCU’s campus.
The land WCU occupies was once called “Tali Tsisgwayahi” or “Two Sparrows Place.” It was one of the oldest Cherokee towns. Riggs discussed how he and Tom Belt rediscovered the name in the field notes of ethnographer James Mooney. Not wanting the name to be lost again, they set out to have the university archeological curation facility named for Two Sparrows Place. The facility was dedicated as Tali Tsisgwayahi Archeological Collections Curation Facility in 2019.
The panelists want this aspect of WCU’s history to be more prominent in its current identity and campus culture.
Denson felt it was a good time to begin having more talks about the land’s heritage in light of an ongoing exhibit planning project that will promote Cherokee culture and language on campus.
Associate Provost for Academic Affairs, Carmen Huffman is leading the project in collaboration with Riggs, Bardo Arts Center Executive Director Denise Drury Homewood and the Cherokee Preservation Foundation. Huffman hopes to see the project’s planning phase completed within the next six months. Once the first phase is complete, the next step will be to apply for more grants to execute the plan. Huffman said this will likely take more than a year.
“The project will bring in more exhibits and wrap its arms around existing installments so that it all feels more cohesive,” she said.
The recent 20th anniversary of responsible archeology at WCU was another influence on Denson’s decision to host the panel. Eastman taught her first archeological field school on campus in 2003. Over three summers, they found that everywhere they looked, there were well-preserved archeological remains of the town beneath up to three feet of fill dirt. Discoveries dated Cherokee inhabitance of the land 9,000 years back.
“We are superimposed on a holy place,” Riggs said.
The difference between Eastman’s work and previously conducted archeology on campus is the collaboration with the Eastern Band Tribal Historic Preservation Office. “That’s a pretty stark contrast with some of the collecting that was done in the mid-twentieth century,” Denson said.
He gave an example of how a mound was demolished in 1956 to allow for construction of the Killian building.
In Cherokee towns, the mound held the council house. Eastman said these council houses could be compared to a church, a courthouse and community center wrapped into one. It was a sacred place.
When the mound was demolished, the university invited people to come and look for artifacts. “They treated it like a celebration of Cherokee history, but really it was an act of desecration,” Denson said.
Some of the artifacts collected included human remains.
Austin Faircloth, a Cherokee student who attended the panel said it is important that the university hold these events and share this knowledge. “I feel like a lot of people don’t realize what they’re walking on every day. Incorporating not only that we were here, but that we are here needs to be shared with everybody that goes to this school,” he said.
Denson wants to see the university learn from its mistakes and ensure that future initiatives are well informed.
“As we take on this new campus interpretation, we have to confront that broader history as an institution,” Denson said. “These old patterns remind us that an institution like a university can celebrate its indigenous past without any sense of responsibility to the indigenous present. When we do this kind of work, we have to think about the responsibility that this knowledge bestows upon us.”
