John DePriest is a linguist, musician, educator, and songwriter based out of Bʋlbancha (New Orleans, Louisiana) and is an enrolled member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. He earned a PhD from Tulane University studying language and music in the brain and has taught there in the Center for Global Education since 2016. He also teaches a course on Indigenous Cultures and Communities of the Gulf South through the Gulf Scholars Program. He is the lead singer, banjo player, and songwriter for the band Bogue Chitto, and is actively working to preserve and expand the use of Choctaw language and music, including current work on an album of traditional and original Choctaw music, Taloa Haklo, set to be released in late 2024. He is currently working on projects related to Choctaw language change over time, as well as a chapter on Choctaw hymn translation and authorship as a site of resistance, identity preservation, and syncretism, and will be translating and recording hymns as a component of this project.

Headshot by Sara Luton