A Sacred Path: The Way of the Muscogee Creeks

Nonfiction. Native American Studies. "A SACRED PATH is ultimately about Creek peoplehood. It connects the Muscogee sacred history with the land, the spirit world, the confederacy's sociopolitical organization, and the ceremonial cycle in a carefully researched and well-written single volume. The Chaudhuris' understanding of Creek traditions and their insights into the internal world of traditional Native American values and value systems are unequaled. Jean's work as a researcher and storyteller in her native Muscogee language teamed with Joy's background in philosophy and American Indian studies makes this volume a major contribution to the literature on the Creeks as well as a highly readable and fascinating ethno history"—Tom Holm, Ph.D. (Cherokee-Creek).

The late Jean Chaudhuri was a full-blood Muscogee Creek who brings to bear an in-depth, informed, "insider's" view to this work. She belonged to the bear clan on her mother's side and her father was a member of the bird clan. She was highly active in the community, serving as executive director for the Tucson Indian Center and later the Traditional Indian Alliance, and as chairperson of the Native American Heritage Preservation Coalition. In addition to her legacy of public service, storytelling, and preservation of Indian cultures, she left behind an unedited collection of Creek stories. Her husband, Joyotpaul (Joy) Chaudhuri, is an emeritus professor of political science at Arizona State University (ASU). His central discipline is political philosophy and theory but he has also taught and published in the fields of American Indian politics and public affairs and comparative politics. In A Sacred Path: The Way of the Muscogee Creeks, Joy and Jean Chaudhuri illustrate the rich interconnectedness of the values of the Creek world, or the "Creek mind," and the processes of change that have occurred.