Creeks and Southerners: Biculturalism on the Early American Frontier.

Creeks and Southerners: Biculturalism on the Early American Frontier. By Andrew K. Frank. Indians of the Southeast. (Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press, c. 2005. Pp. xvi, 192. $49.95, ISBN 0-80322016-2.)

Andrew K. Frank's Creeks and Southerners: Biculturalism on the Early American Frontier provides a needed exploration of kinship, clans, and biculturalism within Creek society. Frank examines both non-Creeks who were incorporated into Creek society and the children of Creek/non-Creek intermarriages as these individuals interacted with Creek and colonial communities. The book analyzes how varying groups and individuals were either incorporated or rejected by Creeks and the responses of colonial officials to the growing Creek Confederacy. Frank provides insight into the pre-removal Creek culture by using individual examples of kinship, adoption, enslavement, ransom, and torture employed by Creek villages. These examples bring to life a complex topic. Frank analyzes how incorporation choices influenced the fluid nature of Creek society in pre-removal times.

Frank used a wide variety of primary and secondary works in his research. However, he neglected resources that give a French perspective on Creek society. The letters of Jean Baptiste Le Moyne, Sieur de Bienville, concerning the attempts of the French to create alliances among the Alabama, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and others of the Gulf Coast region could add context to Creek practices, as would Old Mobile: Fort Louis de la Louisiane, 1702-1711 (Mobile, Ala., 1977), by Jay Higginbotham.

Frank restricts his study of the offspring of intermarriages to the few who rose to prominence within Creek and/or colonial societies. This restriction is partly a result of the lack of available information, as the majority of the offspring did not come to the attention of the European American observers. Frank admits that most of the children of intermarriages "grew up and otherwise lived indistinguishably from the rest of their people" (p. 10). Such an approach, however, limits the understanding of biculturalism within Creek society.

Frank chose to use a chronological approach only in the first and last chapters of the book, defending this choice by asserting that "the rules of kinship that controlled their [non-Creeks and their children] entrance into Creek society remained remarkably consistent throughout the pre-removal era" (p. 4). Unfortunately, the introductory and summary chapters were minimally chronological and leave the reader struggling to find historical context. Isolating kinship, identity, and biculturalism from other issues may help locus attention on the topic at hand. However, this method hinders a thorough understanding of the complex reasons why the Creeks accepted or rejected varying individuals and groups.

Despite these weaknesses, Andrew Frank's book stands as a valuable addition to the scholarship on the Creek Nation in pre-removal times. While others debate when the Creek Confederacy began, Frank uses the analysis of biculturalism and kinship along the Creek frontier to shed light on how the confederacy gradually emerged over time. This approach provides a more thorough understanding of how culture and kinship affected internal and external relations such as trade and alliances. Creeks and Southerners is a nice contribution to the literature on the history of the southeastern Indians.

REBECCA SEAMAN

Elizabeth City State University