Joey Miller, Dept. of Philosophy, West Chester University  — I would guess that most courses in American universities that cover ethical theories don't include any theories or frameworks based in Indigenous philosophy. While there may be a number of reasons for this absence, it has certainly contributed to the lack of Indigenous representation in philosophy, generally. In an attempt to help rectify this lack of representation, I aim to provide a sketch of how a Native American moral theory functions. 

I will be focusing on explaining how moral concepts from Mvskoke (Muscogee) philosophy can fit together to provide the framework of an Indigenous moral theory. I’m restricting my example of a Native American moral theory to Mvskoke philosophy as this is my tribe and these concepts are the ones with which I’m most familiar. Overall, my aim in this paper is to take ideas and concepts that are central to one Native American ethical framework (Mvskoke) and try to present them in such a way so they can be seen as constituting a “theory” in the same sense as other prominent ethical theories (e.g., Utilitarianism, Deontology, Virtue Ethics, and Care Ethics). The hope isn’t to accurately describe how Native Americans made or make moral decisions (pre-colonially or contemporarily). Instead, I’m trying to write something about Native American philosophy that can be included in courses that cover other, more familiar, western ethical theories.