This is a blog about the many “Hybrid Peoples”, found in the past in many parts of the US, and for the most part still there, thought like all communities many have undergone pronounced change over the last several centuries. Once refered to as “Triracial isolates” by the academic world, these many communities are in many cases products of unique social situations, many having to change again and again to survive revolutions, frontier wars, Jim Crow segregation, then intergration that sought to throw them headlong into a “mainstream” culture few knew much about.
Over their long histories thay adapted and changed top survive.Many continue to change to this day. Almost all have crossed back and forth over the American “Color Line” during their histories, in most cases, many times. Almost all these groups have origins in the colonial era, and have uniquely American experiences as peoples. Emerging from the colonies into an America rife with violence and social upheval, many experienced intense social pressure. The were living in a time of racial and cultural synthesis like no other except possibly our own, and most fought hard and survived to see their descendents proudly claim names and identities that were once markers of racial inferiority.
I am a graduate student in Anthropology who has worked with many different groups during 20 years of research and advocacy. I am from one such hybrid community myself, the Dominicker Indians of the Scott Town, Scotts Ferrry, and Woods communities in the Florida Panhandle. My cousin Pony Hill and I have a book “The Indians of North Florida” which tells the history of our people. Who will tell the story of the many who have yet to be heard from…
Hybrid Peoples 