Resumen de Indexicality, voice, and context in the distribution of Cherokee scripts

Margaret Bender

• Using illustrations from recent Cherokee literacy practices, this article demonstrates that the linguistic anthropological concepts of indexicality and voice may profitably be used to analyze the communicative function of scripts, and literacy in general, as well as spoken language. In Cherokee, alternation patterns between the two scripts in current use are linked, through their vocal qualities and indexical functioning, to social categories of personhood and to the characterization of local social institutions.