At home in Baltimore: An ethnographic approach to the study of Lumbee domestic material culture

"At Home in Baltimore" explores the interior decorations in seven households representing three generations of Lumbee Indians living in Baltimore, Maryland. This dissertation describes and analyzes the interior decorations revealing ways that these Native Americans originally from Robeson County, North Carolina use mass-produced objects purchased at Home Interior parties, yard sales, and discount stores to "remind them of their people" and manage a controversial and complex cultural identity.;While this study analyzes the relationship between people and objects, it is people-centered rather than object-centered. Ethnographic practices, narrative theory, as well as a museum education technique---grounded storytelling---are used to understand the visual cues of an object that prompt a person to tell specific stories about his or her life. The body of the dissertation is a description of each household intertwined with aspects of the residents' life histories revealed through stories told about the objects in their living rooms.;The Lumbee in this study used interior decorations to connect with relationships past and present. Specifically the ceramic farm animals, live and artificial plants, and romanticized country scenes remind them of the people and rural life they knew in North Carolina. The importance of family and religious beliefs prevailed visually in each home in obvious ways---family photographs and Christian imagery---but also through images from other denominations, such as statues of the Virgin Mary, and from popular culture, such as posters of John Wayne, statues of ET, Coca-Cola bottles, English cottages, and pan-Indian images. The conclusion---an analysis of the interior decorations---highlights the common cultural themes that make these eight Lumbee Indians feel at home.;When people use objects for reflection, the images provide effective mirrors and catalysts for narrating and evaluating their life stories. The interior decorations of these households point to the various and often simultaneous ways people live between and among different identities and definitions of culture. The stories told about these objects shift the significance of an object away from the artifact itself to the social relationships that surround it.