In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

5 Teaching the Craft The teaching of the Catawba pottery tradition is guarded jealously. The Indians have always been determined to keep their tribal possession in their hands. One of the major concerns among the potters regarding tribal-based research for this book was that non-Catawba might learn Catawba construction methods. It was ¤nally decided that pottery making is widely taught at every educational level, and Catawba methods would be of little interest to outsiders (Samuel Beck, interview, 3 May 1977, BC). Most Catawba live in extended families. Although pottery was seldom the only source of income, pottery making has always been of great spiritual and economic importance. At any given time, several members of a pottery-making family can be engaged in making pottery . Under ideal extended family conditions, small children watch the entire process from preparing the clay to building, scraping, rubbing , decorating, and, ¤nally, burning the pottery. Learning to make Catawba pottery is a long process. The ¤xed construction methods of more than 100 shapes must be learned. At the beginning of the twentieth century, for most children their only outings were visits to the clay holes and peddling trips. Clay was an integral part of their restricted lives. Children absorbed the tradition slowly and joined in the various processes as they felt inclined or as their assistance was required. When possible, this educational pattern is followed today. On occasion, non-Indians are permitted to join the ranks of the potters and are taught the full range of the tradition. Recent examples include Mae Blue, Hattie George, Dorothy Harris, and Maggie Harris. According to oral tradition, these four women are the only non-Indian potters of the twentieth century not censured by tribal law. Presumably , non-Indians who married into the tribe, before these women, were taught pottery making but no memory of their work remains. Today, of necessity, because some of the potters are married to non-Indians, their spouses are often knowledgeable of the tradition, especially in digging clay and burning pottery. The cottage industry nature of the Catawba way requires that the entire family participate in digging the clay, burning the pottery, and even marketing the wares. Some of the non-Indians occasionally dabble in clay, but tribal and federal Indian law will not allow them to sign and sell their work as Catawba (Public Law 101–644). The Catawba also carefully draw the line between demonstrations and teaching. If demonstrations come close to teaching, the potters will pull back. This happened most recently in 1994 when the Schiele Museum wanted the potters to demonstrate the burning process. The proposal made the Catawba feel cautious. They felt that if an outsider could burn a pot, such a person could also make Catawba style pots and sell them. The demonstrations were cancelled. Today, it has been reported that potters who demonstrate as artists-in-residence through the South Carolina Arts Commission teach the entire process from building to burning pottery, without dispute. This lack of a negative reaction may be tempered by the realization that it is very dif¤cult to demonstrate the burning process in a traditional educational setting such as a school. As a rule, the learning process is so gradual that some potters are at a loss for words to describe when and how they learned. For instance, Edith Brown declared, “No one taught me. I just sat and watched” (Edith Brown, interview, 21 April 1977, BC). Others wax nostalgic when thinking of those formative years. “We played as children, and we’d see them—how they made [the pottery]. I just picked it up. I loved to play in the dirt anyway, in red mud and stuff like that. I started off playing with red mud. I made little wee round pots about like that, and we’d try to put little handles on them and little legs. Then [later on] we got so we got clay” (Jennie Brindle, interview, 11 August 1982, BC). Although Jennie Brindle and Edith Brown abridged their learning process to the simplest of terms, learning to make Catawba pottery is not easy. Clay cannot to be played with. Clay is too valuable, too dif¤cult to obtain. Children, while they must learn, also must be kept from ruining the work of their elders. I guess [I learned] after I got up around seven or eight years old. You know something, they wouldn’t let us mess with clay because we would put trash in it...

Share