Hidden Literacies

Page 2 - Coosaponakeesa’s Practice as a Hidden Literacy

Because she leveraged alphabetic writing and multi-language speech as well as journeys, clothing, and spectacle, creating and interpreting her publication practice—then and now—demands a range of interwoven cultural, material, and linguistic literacies. In other words, understanding her practice also entails considering hidden literacies. For much of her life, Coosaponakeesa deftly engaged in a multimedia and embodied publication practice that shaped the trans-national Creek-Georgian-Yamacraw neighborhood located in what today constitutes parts of Georgia, Alabama, and South Carolina. This testament, which is one of the final extant documents authored by her as she died several years later, emblematizes this practice. The remainder of this essay limns some of those literacies and concludes by discussing how doing so helps trace a longer history of Creek reading and writing. 

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