By MICHAEL CASEY
Associated Press

Illustration of Black Belt Eagle Scout. (Photo Credit: Jules Pools, Pacific Standard)

The beginning of the pandemic was devasting for the leader of the indie rock band Black Belt Eagle Scout, Katherine Paul. All her tours, including one headlining across North America, were canceled and she feared her ascending music career might be over.

She got a day job at a nonprofit and returned to the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community`s homelands in Western Washington. But as Paul, or KP to her friends, spent time in the cedar forests and walked along the Skagit River, she turned to her guitar to deal with the isolation and stress. Those snippets, recorded on her phone, provided the foundation for what would become songs on her powerful, grunge-soaked new record "The Land, The Water, The Sky."

"I feel like if the pandemic hadn’t happened, I probably wouldn’t have made this record," said KP, who writes the songs, sings and plays guitar in the band that was the only Native American artist at the Pitchfork Music Festival in Chicago this month.

"I spent a lot of time outside. I spent a lot more time than normal going on hikes, being part of the land," she continued. "It's not like I never do that stuff but it brought me back to a place where this is who I am.”

The new record, which came out in February, helped launch what has probably been the most successful year so far for Black Belt Eagle Scout. The band toured Europe and will go to Australia later this year. Two of her songs, "Soft Stud" from an earlier record and "Salmon Stinta" from her latest, appear this season on the television series "Reservation Dogs."

Reservation Dogs Music Supervisor Tiffany Anders said she was introduced to the band’s music by the show’s creator, Sterlin Harjo, when they started working on the second season.

"It's always been important for us on this show to include Native American artists, but beyond representation, Black Belt Eagle Scout's music is beautiful and emotional, and fits these characters, their world and landscape __ and the vibe of the show," she said in a statement.

A performance during the Pitchfork Music Festival at Union Park in

Chicago on Saturday, July 22, 2023. (Photo Credit: Chicago Music Guide)

Then there was Pitchfork, a three-day festival that is a significant milestone for indie musicians. The festival is held every year in Chicago’s Union Park and this year’s headliners included Bon Iver, Big Thief and The Smile, which has members of Radiohead.

She admitted stepping on that stage last weekend was nerve-wracking given her high hopes for the show, a feeling compounded by concerns that storms could scuttle their performance. But as she launched into the blistering set of mostly new songs in front of thousands of eager fans, KP found solace in her guitar. She launched several long jams that were punctuated by her twirling her jet- black hair around to the point it obscured her face.

"It was totally a moment," she said with a laugh.

"I kind of cried after we played because it felt so meaningful," she added. "Like, I've always wanted to play this music festival. I remember trying to play one of the years before the pandemic when I was touring and it didn't happen. This year, I was just so stoked to play."

Reaching Pitchfork has been a long journey for the 34-year-old artist, who is a member of the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community and left her home on the reservation in LaConner, Washington, when she was 17 to attend Lewis & Clark College in Oregon and play rock music.

Growing up on the reservation off the Washington coast on islands in the Salish Sea, she drummed and sang cultural songs. As a teenager, she discovered local Pacific Northwest bands like Mount Eerie and the sounds of the Riot Grrrl movement and played one of her first gigs at a small bar called Department of Safety. She moved to Portland, Oregon, due to its outsized role in the indie scene that featured bands like Sleater-Kinney and quickly immersed herself in the music scene playing drums and guitar.

She joined an all-female outfit whom she met at the Rock 'n' Roll Camp for Girls in Portland. She went on to play a lot of small, basement shows with bands like Genders __ whose wolf tattoo she still has on her left arm.

Katherine Paul, who records as Black Belt Eagle Scout. (Photo Credit: Nate Lemeul)

But she wanted to write her own songs and formed Black Belt Eagle Scout in 2013. Her early music was defined by her ethereal singing about love, friendship and healing __ often only accompanied by minimal guitar strumming. But she did rock out on songs like "Soft Stud," which featured searing solos.

"She is a really an authentic musician and she carries a lot of power on stage with her presence and sound," Claire Glass, who plays guitar in the band and first saw KP seven years ago.

KP has said her Native American identify has always been present on her records. But her latest music paints a more vivid picture of life on the Swinomish reservation. There are references to chinook salmon, which are traditionally fished, and a powwow dance.

"I started thinking of feeling grateful for the life that I have been given; this place that I`m from; how much the land, the water, the sky means to me __ being surrounded by it,” KP said of writing the song “Don’t Give Up.” “It has so much more meaning because the land, that's where my people are from.”

Black Belt Eagle Scout is on the cover of her latest album. The scene depicts the musician's connection to the area in Washington where she grew up.

Her songs aren’t meant to directly confront issues like the crisis of missing and murdered Native American women or tribes` forced relocation. It’s not the way she writes songs. Instead, she envisions them connecting with people, drawing more Native Americans to indie rock shows in places like Minneapolis, which has a vibrant Native American community, and inspiring young Native Americans to connect with her after shows.

"Isn't me like being here existing with my music good enough? Can't I just be who I am?" she asked, adding she doesn`t need to speak out from stage about these issues because being Native often means she is already wrestling with them. A judge, for example, ruled in March that BNSF Railway intentionally violated the terms of an easement agreement with the tribe by running 100-car trains carrying crude oil over the reservation.

"As a Native person, you know someone who is missing. Your tribe is trying to get your land back. Those are topics that are part of your everyday life,” she said. "I care about those things deeply but there are certain ways in which my music is, maybe not as direct, but it can be healing."

KP also doesn`t want to be seen just as a rock musician or as a Native artist. "I am a musician who happens to be Native, but I am also a Native musician ... I think I am always both," she said.

Black Belt Eagle Scout performs at SXSW. (Photo Credit: Paul Hudson)

Her latest record aims to show that.

"I kind of had in the back of mind, just kept thinking what would Built to Spill do," KP said of the guitar-heavy, indie-rock band from the Pacific Northwest. "I`ve gone on tour with them and seen their three guitars at one point playing together and how they overlap and all these other things.”

It’s also a more collaborative effort with more musicians playing on the record__ a departure for KP, who is accustomed to doing everything herself. A cellist who played with Nirvana, Lori Goldston, is featured on several songs, as are two violinists, as well as a saxophone and mellotron player.

Takiaya Reed, a first-time producer who is also in a doom metal band, described the experience of working on the record as "beautiful and amazing`` and said the two bonded over their love of punk. Reid also brought her classical training and love of "heavier sounds" to the studio.

"We approached it fearlessly. It was wonderful to be expansive in terms of sonic possibilities," she said.

KP also wanted to find a place for her parents, whom she had grown especially close to during the pandemic, to play on the record. She chose the song "Spaces, " which she described as having a "healing vibe.” Her dad, who is one of the main singers at the tribe’s cultural events, embraced the idea of lending his powerful powwow chant to the song. Her mom sang harmonies.

KP said: "It meant the world to me to have my parents sing because it felt like it was full circle in who I am.”

'The Land You Know Has Been Given to You,’ Film Documents Quechan Battling Gold and Lithium Mining

Article by Brenda Norrell
Censored News

Members of the Quechan Indian Tribe in California and other groups are in opposition of gold mining taking place on 20 acres of public land. (Photo Credit: The Land You Know Has Been Given to You)

Gold is the 'snake's blood; and the creatures in the desert will die because of the greed of corporations, including the Canadian gold company now targeting Quechan's sacred land

This land was given to the people and creatures long before the Europeans came here. Now, gold, lithium, and geothermal miners are destroying it. They are not from here, it doesn't matter to them, and it is the public that is letting them do it, said Preston Arrow-Weed, Quechan elder. "They have no right to go and destroy it for the gold," says Arrow-weed in a new film, "The Land You Know has been Given to You," just released.

"The gold is the snake's blood," he said, adding that the big corporations come in, and leave all that destruction behind.

"This land was given to us."

"My knowledge of history comes from songs," Arrow-weed said, sharing the history of the Quechan here.

In the Cargo Muchacho Mountains, northwest of Winterhaven, in southern California, is the Quechan homeland, the Oro Cruz project mineral exploration is on about 20 acres of public lands and consist of up to 65 drill sites within seven drill areas. The overall area for the plan’s boundary is about 626 acres. The project is by the SMP Gold Corp., of British Columbia, Canada, in the existing Oro Cruz Mine Area, where multiple drilling and large-scale open pit operations had previously existed before ceasing operations in 1996 because of declining gold prices, the SMP Gold website stated. -- Calexico Chronicle

Arrow-weed said they are destroying the mountain, simply to get gold to line their pockets. They're digging for gold everywhere they can and creatures are dying. They are mining for lithium and geothermal digging near the San Andres fault.

"It's the public that lets them do it."

"The people with the money are running the government."

Faron Owl, Quechan Tribal Councilperson (left) with film producer-director
Robert Lundahl .(Photo Credit: The Land You Know Has Been Given to You)

Filmmaker Robert Lundahl said, "Honored to participate with Preston J. Arrow-weed and Faron Owl, along with Bradley Angel and Greenaction in the creation of this video, "The Land You Know Has Been Given To You." Ceremony and discussion about lithium and gold mining in California."

See the film here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pqo0w_8MQnM

Bradley Angel and Robert Lundahl, Producers and Directed by Robert Lundahl ©Copyright 2023, Agence RLA, LLC, Greenaction, 14 minutes

ALL THE NEWS THEY DON’T WANT YOU TO SEE

Censored News is published by Brenda Norell, a well-known journalist in Indian Country for 40 years. She began as a reporter at the Navajo Times during the 18 years she lived on the Navajo reservation. Norell was a stringer for AP and USA Today and holds the rare distinction of being blacklisted by all the mainstream media for 17 years.

Strawberry: The Food of the Skyworld

by Doug George-Kanentiio

Among the traditional Mohawks there is a special appreciation for the strawberry plant-called Niihontesha. It is a unique plant as its seeds are outside of the skin of the berry and is the first one to ripen in the early summer.

The strawberry plant itself comes from Karonhia:ke (the Skyworld). It is said that when the first human type being descended to the earth from the sky world (Karonhia:keh) she brought three plants with her: Niihontesha, Onenstateh (corn) and Oienkwa:onweh (tobacco).

Called Atsitsakaiion (Mature Flower) Skywoman created the current dimensions of the continent we call Anowara:kowa (the Great Turtle) as she danced counter-clockwise, her feet caressing the land as the seeds of the plants took root and grew. The rhythm and style of her dancing is carried on by the Mohawks to the current day with the “Women’s Dance” songs said to be the first ones sung by human beings in this part of the world. It is also the food which sustains us once our physical bodies die and our spirits begin their journey along the great star path back to Karonhia:ke which lies beyond Teka:tsi:stoh:kwaieron:nion:ha:ton (the “many constellations” aka the “milky way”).

When Iroquois Mother Goddess, Sky Woman, fell from the sky she was clutching strawberries in one hand and tobacco in the other.

When the strawberries are ripe in their natural state in the fields a group of female and male spiritual advisers called “faithkeepers” (Iakoterihonton for the women and Roterihonton for the men) will counsel the leaders of the nation (Iakoia:ne-clanmothers and Roia:ne-male “chief”) that the time is right for the people to gather at the longhouse to celebrate the return of the plant.

A one-day ceremony will be held during which the people will prepare a special drink of strawberry juice and maple syrup, blended to be light and refreshing. The leaders will address the plant itself as the Mohawks believe that which grows, whether tree, animal or earth, responds to the human voice. The Mohawks have long held that water and other earth elements have what is referred to as their own way but interlocked with our lives. They react to what we say and particularly the music we make with our voices and minds.

Harsh, angry music or words deter a plant’s growth, just as it will a child, and actually effect the energy and appearance of lakes, rivers and streams. Music of this kind also has a negative impact on the water we consume and since our bodies are mostly liquid that kind of angry human expression may bring harm to ourselves.

By outwardly expressing thanks to the strawberry, we release its curative and nutritional powers. The Mohawks are careful in their selection of which berry to pick and will always leave the first plant as it is the guardian for the rest. As the picking takes place the Mohawk harvester is saying words of gratitude and apology for taking the fruit of the plant, assuring it that enough is left behind to regenerate and that it will be used for the right purposes. No chemical is permitted as this may bring harm to the fruit.

Attendees at the annual festival.

Once assembled the people will bring the strawberry to the ceremonial place and will take their seats according to which of the three clans (bear, wolf, turtle) they belong. The individual will rise and give thanks using a quiet and respectful tone. After this is done the clanmothers will announce to the people that in the past few months a certain number of girls (Ieksa:ah) have been born since the Midwinter Ceremony in winter. They are now ready to be shown to the people to be welcomed into the longhouse family. The female infants (boys are named at another ceremony months later) are carried by the Roiane to the centre of the longhouse and show to the people and to the four directions with their new names spoken so that all of creation will know of this new being.

The names given to the girls are theirs along and will be used throughout their lives as the primary means by which they will interact with the plants, medicines, animal live, the earth and by the spiritual beings. These are called Rationhia:kehronon (sky people). Others may call them “angels” but to the Mohawks the relationship is much more dynamic and involved. The sky people will, depending upon need and specific request, provide guidance and direction to the infant throughout their lives.

The Strawberry Ceremony is one of the most ancient of all Mohawk rituals. Throughout the year the preserved fruit will be used to give thanks for the gift of life. Since it is in a heart shape, with long root threads resembling arteries and veins, it is an excellent natural medicine for that organ. People who have heart disease or are recovering from a heart attack are advised to heal by consuming the fruit and drinking tea from its roots and leaves.

Eleanor Spears Dove, Narragansett elder, sampled a strawberry from a basket passed at the Narragansett Strawberry Thanksgiving, another popular event.

It is said the strawberry plants likes to be among humans and can be found in its natural state near the homes of the Mohawk people. It is also taught that other humans from across the salt water will bring about great environmental destruction to the Great Turtle to the extent that indigenous plants and animals will disappear. In time, natural strawberries will no longer grow, a certain sign of the great ecological changes now imminent.
While the strawberries carry on their original instructions it seems human beings are now far from theirs. Yet the Mohawks continue to celebrate this most wonderful of Skyworld gifts.

(From News from Indian Country)

Influential American Indian Scholars

By Academic Influence Staff

Our list of 35 scholars of American Indian descent features historians, anthropologists, professors, and researchers alongside artists, authors, educators, and activists. These luminaries have helped shape the course of history within their communities, the broader cross-section of American Indian peoples, and for America as a whole.

These influential Native American scholars include academics and professionals who span a wide breadth of disciplines and who are touchstone figures in a broad spectrum of cultural movements and moments. The people highlighted here include historians, anthropologists, professors, and researchers alongside artists, authors, educators, and activists. Representing a sweeping diversity of Native American Tribes and Nations from Crow to Choctaw; Tuscarora to Muscogee Creek; Abenaki to Cherokee, the luminaries included on our list have helped shape the course of history within their respective indigenous communities, for the broader cross-section of American Indian peoples, and beyond.

Also represented within our list are the deep roots that so many Native American scholars have planted in the academy. The list below, which is composed both of living influencers and powerful figures who are no longer with us, demonstrates the profound and permeating influence of so many renowned American Indian academics, educators, and creatives. Included are people who remain active in the academy, and who still impact the world of learning, often in a multidisciplinary capacity. And there are those that, though deceased, have achieved a far-reaching legacy of influence and impact that persists today.

The people included in our list were identified using our machine-powered Influence Ranking algorithm, which produces a numerical score of academic achievements, merits, and citations across Wikipedia/data, Crossref, Semantic Scholar and an ever-growing body of data in order to identify top influencers in their respective areas of expertise.

Find out more about our Methodology.

The following list is presented alphabetically and is therefore not intended to suggest a ranking of individuals. Instead, this is a comprehensive list of the top American Indian Scholars impacting the world today.

Influential American Indian Scholars

#1

Osceola Macarthy Adams
1890 - 1983

Osceola Macarthy Adams was an American actress, drama teacher, director, and clothing designer. She was one of the 22 founders of the Delta Sigma Theta sorority. Born to a life insurance executive in Albany, Georgia, Macarthy was mixed with European, Native American, and African American heritage. She attended schools in Albany, Georgia including Albany Normal School, a predecessor to Albany State University, and then attended Fisk University's Preparatory School. Later, she attended Howard University, where she studied ancient Greek and philosophy.

#2

Taiaiake Alfred

Gerald Taiaiake Alfred is an author, educator, and activist, born in Montreal, Quebec in 1964 and raised in the community of Kahnawake. Alfred is an internationally recognized Kanien'kehá:ka professor. Alfred grew up in Kahnawake and received a B.A. in History from Concordia University, an M.A. and Ph.D. from Cornell University. He served in the US Marine Corps in the 1980s. Alfred was the founding director of the University of Victoria's Indigenous Governance Program (serving from 1999 until 2015) and was awarded a Canada Research Chair 2003–2007, in addition to a National Aboriginal Achievement Award in education.

#3

Alvin Eli Amason

Alvin Eli Amason is a Sugpiaq Alaskan painter and sculptor. He was raised in Kodiak and is of Alutiiq ancestry. He received his Master of Fine Arts from Arizona State University and taught for several years at Navajo Community College. For seventeen years, he taught at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and was the head of the Alaska Native Art studies program there. After retiring, he was asked to join the Department of Art at the University of Alaska, Anchorage and develop an Alaska Native Art curriculum.

#4

JoAllyn Archambault

JoAllyn Archambault is a cultural anthropologist with an expertise in Native American people. She is the director of the Smithsonian Institution’s American Indian Program. Born to a Sioux father and Creek mother, Archambault was raised in Sioux traditions and is a member of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe of North and South Dakota. Archambault has made a great contribution to anthropology by providing an insider’s perspective to her research on Native American people.

#5

Noelani Arista

Denise Noelani Manuela Arista is an associate professor of Hawaiian and US History in the Department of History at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. Her scholarship focuses on 19th century American History, Hawaiian History and Literature, Indigenous epistemology and translation, and Colonial and Indigenous history and historiography. Arista was born and raised in Honolulu, Hawaiʻi and she graduated from the Kamehameha Schools in 1986. She received both her BA (1992) and her MA (1998) in Hawaiian Religion from the Department of Religion at the University of Hawai'i at Mānoa. In 2010, she earned her PhD from the Department of History at Brandeis University. Arista's dissertation, "Histories of Unequal Measure: Euro-American Encounters with Hawaiian Governance and Law, 1793-1827," won the 2010 Allan Nevins Prize from the Society of American Historians for the "best-written doctoral dissertation on a significant subject in American history". Arista was hired as an assistant professor in the Department of History at the University of Hawai'i at Mānoa in 2008. In 2013-14, Arista was a post-doctoral fellow in the Department of English at the University of Pennsylvania. In 2018, Arista was promoted to associate professor of Hawaiian History at the University of Hawai'I.

#6

Jodi Byrd

Jodi Byrd holds a master's degree and Ph.D. (2002) in English literature from the University of Iowa. Her dissertation was Colonialism's Cacophony: Natives and Arrivants at the Limits of Postcolonial Theory. Before moving to Cornell University, she taught at the University of Illinois Chicago, and before that she was an assistant professor of indigenous politics in the department of political science of the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. She was formerly associated with the American Indian Studies Program at Illinois. She was president of the Association for the Study of American Indian Literatures for 2011–2012. In 2012, she was adopted as a Clan Sister (one of the central organizing members) of the Native American Literature Symposium, which she has stated has been an inspiring community for her since her first days as a graduate student.

#7

Gregory Cajete

Gregory Cajete is a Tewa author and professor from Santa Clara Pueblo, New Mexico. Cajete earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in biology and sociology from New Mexico Highlands University, with a minor in secondary education. His Master of Arts degree is from the University of New Mexico, and his doctorate is from the International College, Los Angeles's New Philosophy Program. His Philosophy Doctorate is in social science Education with an emphasis in Native American Studies. Currently he is director of the Native American Studies program and associate professor of education at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque. He has been a New Mexico Humanities scholar of ethnobotany and is a member of the New Mexico Arts Commission.

#8

Ward Churchill

Ward LeRoy Churchill is an American author and political activist. He was a professor of ethnic studies at the University of Colorado Boulder from 1990 until 2007. The primary focus of his work is on the historical treatment of political dissenters and Native Americans by the United States government. His work features controversial and provocative views, written in a direct, often confrontational style.

#9

Joe Medicine Crow
1913 - 2016

Joseph Medicine Crow was a Native American writer, historian, and war chief of the Crow Nation. His writings on Native American history and reservation culture are considered seminal works, but he is best known for his writings and lectures concerning the Battle of the Little Bighorn of 1876.

#10

Jeffrey Gibson

Jeffrey A. Gibson is a Mississippi Choctaw -Cherokee painter and sculptor from the United States, based in Hudson, New York. Background Early life Born in Colorado, as a child his family moved frequently. As a youth he lived in and Korea. Important to his role as an artist, press releases state that “This unique combination of cultural perspectives and exposure are essential to understanding Gibson’s artworks that combine and transform seemingly disparate references drawn from both Western and non-Western sources.”

#11

Richard W. Hill Sr.

Rick Hill is a citizen of the Beaver Clan of the Tuscarora Nation of the Haudenosaunee at Grand River. He holds a master's degree in American Studies. He is the former Assistant Director for Public Programs, National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution; Museum Director, Institute of American Indian Arts, Santa Fe, NM; and Assistant Professor, Native American Studies, SUNY Buffalo. He recently retired as Senior Project Coordinator of the Deyohahá:ge: Indigenous Knowledge Centre at Six Nations Polytechnic, Ohsweken, Ontario. Rick is currently a Distinguished Fellow – Adjunct Professor and curriculum developer at Mohawk College, in Hamilton, Ontario.

#12

Valjean McCarty Hessing
1934 - 2006

Valjean McCarty Hessing was a Choctaw painter, who worked in the Bacone flatstyle. Throughout her career, she won 9- awards for her work and was designated a Master Artist by the Five Civilized Tribes Museum in 1976. Her artworks are in collections of the Heard Museum of Phoenix, Arizona; the Philbrook Museum of Art in Tulsa, Oklahoma; the Southern Plains Indian Museum in Anadarko, Oklahoma; and the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian of Santa Fe, New Mexico, among others.

#13

LeAnne Howe

LeAnne Howe (born April 29, 1951) is an American author and Eidson Distinguished Professor in the Department of English at the University of Georgia, Athens. She previously taught American Indian Studies and English at the University of Minnesota and at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and is a member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma.

#14

Georgia Mills Jessup
1926 - 2016

Georgia Mills Jessup was an American painter, sculptor, ceramicist, muralist, and collage artist. Early life and education Jessup, a native of Washington, D.C., was of African American, Native American, and European descent. Her father, Joseph Mills, was a member of the Pamunkey tribe; her mother was Margaret Hall Mills, a hairdresser who had dreamed of a career in the theater. The thirteenth of eighteen children, she was one of twenty-nine members of her family who followed an artistic profession. After an early display of artistic talent, she was apprenticed to Herman L. Walker; two of her paintings were shown at the 1939 World's Fair, when she was just 13 years old. Jessup was a 1943 graduate of Dunbar High School. She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Howard University, where she studied with Loïs Mailou Jones, in 1959, following that with a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Catholic University of America in 1969.

#15

Jennie R. Joe

Jennie R. Joe (born 1941) is an American academic, medical anthropologist, and fellow of the Society for Applied Anthropology. Initially trained as a nurse, she was one of the health clinic workers during Occupation of Alcatraz in 1969. She is a professor in the Departments of Family and Community Medicine and American Indian Studies at the University of Arizona. Joe was one of the inaugural board members for the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian and serves on the board of the Urban Indian Health Commission.

#16

Ruthe Blalock Jones

Ruthe Blalock Jones is a Delaware Shawnee painter and printmaker from Oklahoma. Jones was born on June 8, 1939, in Claremore, Oklahoma. Her parents are Joe and Lucy Parks Blalock. Her tribal name is Chulundit.

#17

Daniel Heath Justice

Daniel Heath Justice is an American-born Canadian academic and citizen of the Cherokee Nation. He is professor of First Nations and Indigenous Studies and English at the University of British Columbia. He started his studies at University of Northern Colorado and received his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. He began his career at the University of Toronto, where he taught English and worked in association with the Aboriginal Studies Program. Why Indigenous Literatures Matter (2018) is the winner of the NAISA (Native American and Indigenous Studies Association) Award for Subsequent Book published in 2018. It also received the 2019 PROSE Award, granted by the Association of American Publishers, in the category of Literature and was nominated for the Gabrielle Roy Prize for Literary Criticism from the Association of Canadian and Quebec Literatures (ACQL). In 2015, Justice was awarded the UBC Killam Research Prize in recognition of his leadership in the field of Indigenous Literary Studies and for his many contributions to it, including Our Fire Survives the Storm: A Cherokee Literary History (2006) and The Oxford Handbook of Indigenous American Literature (co-edited with James H. Cox, 2014). In 2010, he was awarded the Ludwik and Estelle Jus Memorial Human Rights Prize at the University of Toronto.

#18

Tsianina Lomawaima

Tsianina Lomawaima is an interdisciplinary researcher of Indigenous Studies, anthropology, history, and political science. She is a professor in the School of Social Transformation at Arizona State University. She specializes in the interaction between sovereign Native nations and U.S. federalism, the status of Native people as U.S. citizens, and federal Indian policy particularly in education. Her historical focus is the early 20th century.

#19

Henrietta Mann

Henrietta Mann (Cheyenne, b. 1934) is a Native American academic and activist. She was one of the designers of the Native American studies programs at University of California, Berkeley, the University of Montana, and Haskell Indian Nations University. In 2000 she became the first American Indian to hold the endowed chair of Native American studies at Montana State University and was honored with the Montana Governor's Humanities Award. She retired in 2004 and became a special advisor to the president of Montana State University.

#20

Devon A. Mihesuah

Devon A. Mihesuah (born 2 June 1957) is an enrolled citizen of the Choctaw Nation, a historian and writer, and a previous editor of the American Indian Quarterly. She is the Cora Lee Beers Price Professor in the Humanities Program at the University of Kansas. She is the second Native woman to receive a named/distinguished professorship (the first is Henrietta Mann). Her lineage is well-documented in multiple tribal records. Mihesuah has written award-winning books and articles about colonization, boarding schools, stereotypes, research methodologies, Indigenous women, AIM, repatriation, racism, violence against Natives, "fake news," slander and libel against Natives, in addition to a series of award-winning novels.

#21

Simon J. Ortiz

Simon J. Ortiz (born May 27, 1941) is a Native American writer, poet, and enrolled member of the Pueblo of Acoma. Ortiz is one of the key figures in the second wave of what has been called the Native American Renaissance. He attended Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado, as a chemistry major with the help of a BIA educational grant. While enthralled with language and literature, the young Ortiz never considered pursuing writing seriously; at the time, it was not a career that seemed viable for Native people; it was "a profession only whites did." Since 1968, Ortiz has taught creative writing and Native American literature at various institutions, including San Diego State University, the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, Diné College, the College of Marin, the University of New Mexico, Sinte Gleska University, and the University of Toronto. He currently teaches at Arizona State University.

#22

Bertha Parker Pallan
1907 - 1978

Bertha Pallan Thurston Cody was an American archaeologist, working as an assistant in archaeology at the The Autry Museum. She was also married to actor Iron Eyes Cody. She is thought to be the first Native American female archaeologist of Abenaki and Seneca descent.

#23

Christopher J. Pexa

Christopher Pexa specializes in 19th and 20th century Native American and U.S. literatures, Native American studies, and settler colonial studies, with an emphasis on questions of indigenous ethics, sovereignty, and nationalism. He completed his latest book with University of Minnesota Press, entitled Translated Nation: Rewriting the Dakota Oyate, that explores the ambivalent ways in which allotment-era Dakota authors played to white regimes of legibility while at the same time honoring tribal common sense and producing a contemporary Dakota nationhood. Pexa's essays have appeared or are forthcoming in PMLA, Wíčazo Ša Review, SAIL, and MELUS. He is also a published poet and is currently working on a book of prose poetry, entitled Throne of Horses, about the afterlives of Indian boarding schools.

#24

Jolene Rickard

Jolene Rickard, born 1956, citizen of the Tuscarora Nation, Turtle Clan, is an artist, curator and visual historian at Cornell University, specializing in indigenous peoples’ issues. Rickard co-curated two of the four permanent exhibitions for the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian.

#25

Alice Mary Robertson
1854 - 1931

Alice Mary Robertson was an American educator, social worker, Native Americans’ rights activist, government official, and politician who became the second woman to serve in the United States Congress, and the first from the state of Oklahoma. Robertson was the first woman to defeat an incumbent congressman. She was known for her strong personality, commitment to Native American issues, and anti-feminist stance.

#26

Luana Ross

Luana K. Ross (born 1949) is a Native American sociologist of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, located at Flathead Indian Reservation in Montana. She received her bachelor's degree from the University of Montana in 1979, her master's degree from Portland State University, and her doctorate in sociology from the University of Oregon in 1992, before serving as faculty at the University of California, Davis and University of California, Berkeley. Since 1999 she has been a faculty member for the Department of Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies at the University of Washington. She has also been an Adjunct Professor in American Indian Studies at the University of Washington since 1999. In January 2010, she was appointed president of Salish Kootenai College, effective in July of that year. She resigned from the position in 2012.

#27

Leilani Sabzalian

Dr. Leilani Sabzalian (Alutiiq) is an Assistant Professor of Indigenous Studies in Education and the Co-Director of the Sapsik'wałá (Teacher) Education Program at the University of Oregon. Her research focuses on creating spaces to support Indigenous students and Indigenous self-determination in public schools, and preparing teachers to challenge colonialism in curriculum, policy, and practice. She is also dedicated to improving Indigenous education in the state of Oregon by serving on the American Indian/Alaska Native State Advisory Committee and collaborating with the Office of Indian Education on professional development to support the implementation of Tribal History/Shared History, a law that mandates curriculum on tribal history and sovereignty in all K-12 public schools in Oregon.

#28

Audra Simpson

A member of the Mohawk Tribe, Audra Simpson is a professor of anthropology at Columbia University. Simpson focuses on the politics of recognition, specifically the Kahnawà:ke Mohawk struggles in keeping their legal and cultural rights. Her book, Mohawk Interruptus, was celebrated by Indigenous studies scholars as a critical addition to education on tribal community and national identity. As an anthropologist, a career in a field that is notorious for exploiting and thinking of Natives only in the past tense, Simpson pushes against these notions by centering on Native epistemologies.

#29

James Thomas Stevens

James Thomas Stevens (born 1966) is an American poet and academic. He is a member of the Akwesasne Mohawk Nation and currently teaches at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico. James Thomas Stevens was born in Niagara Falls, New York, and his Mohawk name is Aronhió:ta's. His father was a Welsh-American and his mother is Mohawk. In 1993 Stevens earned his MFA in writing from Brown University Graduate Writing Program, where he had a full fellowship. He earned a Creative Writing AFA from the Institute of American Indian Arts, where he received the Gerald Red Elk Scholarship in 1990, allowing him to attend the Naropa Institute Summer Writing Program. Stevens briefly attended the School of Visual Arts and Brooklyn College in New York. Stevens was an associate professor in the English Department of SUNY Fredonia and the director of American Indian Studies. He has also been an Instructor of Poetry at Brown University and taught at Haskell Indian Nations University. He is an author of numerous volumes of poetry. An international poet with professional invitations to France, Turkey, and China, Stevens spoke at the IIPF in the United Nations in 2006. He formerly taught at Haskell Indian Nations University and remains a vibrant member of the Native community as well as a leading young American Poet.

#30

Kim TallBear

Kim TallBear (born 1968) is a Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate professor at the University of Alberta, specializing in racial politics in science. Holding the first ever Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Peoples, Technoscience and Environment, TallBear has published on DNA testing, race science and Indigenous identities, as well as on polyamory as a decolonization practice. TallBear is a citizen of the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate in South Dakota, as well as a descendant from the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes of Oklahoma.

#31

France Winddance Twine

France Winddance Twine is an American sociologist, documentary filmmaker, a visual artist and an enrolled citizen of the Muscogee Creek Nation of Oklahoma. A native of Chicago, she is the granddaughter of Paul Twine, Sr., a Civil Rights activist and founding member of the Catholic Interracial Council of Chicago, a Civil Rights organization that brought Irish, Italian, German, Polish and Black Catholics together to fight for racial justice. Dr. Twine is a Professor of Sociology at the University of California at Santa Barbara where she regularly teaches courses on race, gender and class inequality, sociology of the body, sociology of work, girlhood, assisted reproductive technologies and qualitative research methods.

#32

Gerald Vizenor

Gerald Robert Vizenor (born 1934) is an American writer and scholar, and an enrolled member of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, White Earth Reservation. Vizenor also taught for many years at the University of California, Berkeley, where he was Director of Native American Studies. With more than 30 books published, Vizenor is Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, and Professor of American Studies at the University of New Mexico. After a stint in the military upon returning to the United States in 1953, Vizenor took advantage of G.I. Bill funding to complete his undergraduate degree at New York University. He followed this with postgraduate study at Harvard University and the University of Minnesota Duluth, where he also undertook graduate teaching. After teaching at the university, between 1964 and 1968, Vizenor worked as a community advocate. During this time, he served as director of the American Indian Employment and Guidance Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, which brought him into close contact with numerous Native Americans from reservations. Vizenor began working as a staff reporter on the Minneapolis Tribune, quickly rising to become an editorial contributor. He investigated the case of Thomas James White Hawk, convicted of murder. Vizenor's perspective allowed him to raise difficult questions about the nature of justice in a society dealing with colonized peoples. His work was credited with enabling White Hawk to have his death sentence commuted.

#33

Robert Allen Warrior

Robert Allen Warrior (born 1963) is a scholar and Hall Distinguished Professor of American Literature and Culture at the University of Kansas. With Paul Chaat Smith, he co-authored Like a Hurricane: The Indian Movement from Alcatraz to Wounded Knee. He is generally recognized, along with Craig Womack, as being one of the founders of American Indian literary nationalism. Warrior served as President of the American Studies Association from 2016 to 2017. He earned a bachelor's degree in speech communication from Pepperdine University, a master's degree in religion from Yale University, and a doctoral degree in systematic theology from Union Theological Seminary in New York City. In 1999, Warrior taught at Cornell University. Warrior previously taught at Stanford University, the University of Oklahoma, and the University of Illinois Chicago. He has served as president of the American Studies Association (ASA) and helped found the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association (NAISA). In 2018, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences inducted Warrior.

#34

Robert A. Williams Jr.

Robert A. Williams Jr. is an American lawyer, author, and legal scholar. He works in the fields of federal Indian law, international law, indigenous peoples' rights, critical race, and post-colonial theory. Williams teaches at the University of Arizona's James E. Rogers College of Law, serving as Regents Professor, E. Thomas Sullivan Professor of Law and Faculty Chair of the Indigenous Peoples Law and Policy Program. Williams is an enrolled member of the Lumbee Indian Tribe of North Carolina. He earned his B.A. from Loyola University Maryland in Maryland in 1977 and his J.D. from Harvard University Law School in 1980.

#35

Alfred Young Man

Alfred Young Man, Ph.D. or Kiyugimah (Eagle Chief) (born 1948) is a Cree artist, writer, educator, and an enrolled member of the Chippewa-Cree tribe located on the Rocky Boy Indian Reservation, Montana. He is a former Department Head (2007–2010) of Indian Fine Arts at the First Nations University of Canada in Regina, Saskatchewan, and former Chair (1999–2007) of Native American Studies, University of Lethbridge, Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada. He is Professor Emeritus at the University of Lethbridge and University of Regina.

About Academic Influence

Academic Influence is staffed by academics and data scientists working to provide an objective, non-gameable influence-based ranking for the people, schools, and disciplinary programs that make up higher education. They have engineered a unique ranking technology that employs machine learning to measure the impact of work produced by the world’s top academic influencers. The Influence Ranking™ engine brings to light the achievements of top institutions and top academics across the globe. The organization maintains an incredibly rich and varied website, with features to help readers explore the world of higher education.

Homepage Photo Credit: American Academy of Arts and Sciences

OP-ED: Indian Country’s Once-In-A-Seven-Generation Opportunity

by Dawson Her Many Horses

Her Many Horses is head of Native American Banking for Wells Fargo. The bank underwrote a historic $50 million commitment to address the unique economic, social, and environmental needs of Native Peoples, where Her Many Horses leads the initiative.

For centuries, tribal communities and individual Native Americans and their families have bobbed and weaved when confronted with severe conditions and immoral treatment. Some did more than survive; they thrived in the face of adversity. While COVID-19 highlighted harsh realities of the disparate treatment of Indian Country, it also surfaced a once-in-a-seven-generation’s opportunity to reimagine how Indian Country could position itself — not just for the immediate future but for decades and centuries to come.

This opinion provides an analysis of the challenges and opportunities for achieving economic resiliency in Indian Country, starting with three barriers to action: data gaps, the digital desert, and a fragmented capital landscape.

Data Gaps

Unlike state governments or publicly held companies, Tribal governments, and the businesses they own, do not disclose financial information. In return, data and information that businesses with an interest in expanding into tribal communities would typically use to make investment decisions is not available for Indian Country.  Revenue from businesses controlled by tribal governments (not tax revenue) provides the bulk of funding to tribal governments, which funds essential services such as housing, infrastructure, health care, education, elder care, and cultural and language preservation.

Digital Desert

Digital solutions buoyed companies, communities, and economies that successfully leveraged them during the pandemic, which disproportionately impacted people and places on the other side of the digital divide. Businesses with a strong online presence outperformed those without. Expanding broadband access could enable a wave of technology entrepreneurship, build foundations for professional, academic, and social networks, and provide access to digital banking (reducing the number of unbanked tribal households and helping low-income households apply for government and nonprofit programs).

Fragmented Capital Landscape

Fragmentation of Indian Country’s capital landscape — featuring many different types of financial institutions with varying levels of presence and investment ranges and thresholds — is an obstacle to investment and development. This report exposes gaps that could provide opportunities for new capital providers (private equity, venture capital, digital, and neo-banks), once longstanding barriers to investment have been resolved.

The Opportunity Set

The decision-making framework presented in this report is intended to empower traditional and non-traditional stakeholders to effectively prioritize opportunities across tribal communities over the near and long term.

We designed 10 archetypes of tribal economies, aiming to surface common challenges and opportunities for promising inter- and intra-tribal partnerships while avoiding an overly simplistic approach. Starting with a broad universe of opportunities ranging from infrastructure and resources to manufacturing and construction, consumer goods marketing, and technology and other services, leaders can identify and prioritize a specific set of opportunities.

Building true economic resiliency in Indian Country demands new ways of thinking and responding. Tribes can start executing on high-priority, high-potential opportunities including bridging the digital divide. National banks can start partnering with other capital providers to provide funding and share technology. Governments at all levels (federal, state, and local) can establish public-private partnerships to build out projects. All of these constructive actions could have the cumulative impact of contributing to a more prosperous, vital, and economically resilient Indian Country.

We provide a three-phase analysis of opportunities for driving economic resiliency in Indian Country and prioritizing action through the lens of Tribal Nations.

Resiliency principles and key performance indicators (KPIs): Aligning on key themes and drivers of economic resiliency to lay groundwork for analysis.

Baseline and tribal archetypes: Evaluating the current state of Tribal Nations with a data-driven approach and grouping them into archetypes to simplify recommendations and opportunity prioritization.

Prioritization framework and identification of key opportunities: Providing a prioritization framework that can be adapted to a tribes’ circumstances and reviewing and highlighting key opportunities for economic resiliency with examples.

Our recommendations focus on enabling factors that support and drive economic resiliency by improving self-determination.

Lastly, we summarize conclusions and specific next steps for stakeholders (including tribes, National banks, and governments) to act on these recommendations.

Native American Participants Selected for Animation Lab

The LA Skins Fest recently announced they have selected the 8 participants for their Native American Animation Lab, a talent development program that aims to boost the careers of Native American in the field of animation.

“We have a talented community in need of exposure, access, and opportunity. This new endeavor will get more Native American voices in front of the right people who can develop their animation projects and build their animation careers.” stated Ian Skorodin (Choctaw), LA Skins Fest Founder.

The participants will take part in a five day curriculum that will have them meeting with executives from Universal Pictures, Cartoon Network Studios, Kung Fu Monkey Productions and many others. The lab will consist of daily workshops, seminars and one-on-one mentoring to help each participant develop a project for the pitch panel at the end of the lab.

The five day total immersion lab will be mentored and guided by Writer/Producer Donick Cary (Simpsons/Parks and Recreation/Ap Bio). At the end of the program, each participant will pitch a panel of executives from the program’s corporate supporters.

The Lab was created to expand the amount of Native Americans working behind the camera, as a way to increase fair and accurate portrayals of Native Americans on television.

Its sponsors include: Comcast NBCUniversal, The Walt Disney Company, Cartoon Network Studios, Sugarshack Animation, Women in Animation, and Otter Media brands, Crunchyroll, Fullscreen and Rooster Teeth.

For more information, visit laskinsfest.com

The 8 participants:

Ben-Alex Dupris is Mnicoujou Lakota, and also an enrolled member of the Colville Confederated Tribes where he grew up. Dupris creates work that pushes the boundaries of modernity and traditionalism in hopes of changing perspectives of Indigenous concepts without censorship. His directorial debut "Sweetheart Dancers" won Grand Jury Award for Best Short Film at Outfest 2019. He recently directed an American Masters "Masters in the Making" for PBS and Firelight Media about the artist Bunky Echo-Hawk that premiered at DOC NYC 2019. He is developing an animation series based on tribal legend stories that reflect the changing nature of Indigenous relationships to the earth in the 21st century.

Pasquale Encell and Steve Encell. Pasquale (Modoc) and his partner, Steve (Modoc), who is also his father, started a small animation team in Thailand. Steve served in the US Army and studied Agricultural Business at Cal Poly, and realized that the Native elders he knew were disappearing and soon they would be gone forever. Because of this, he decided to study with several medicine men and leaders before their knowledge disappeared. With his partner and son, Pasquale, they created Thunder Eagle Productions and chose animation as their main conduit of production. They have made several animated movies that have played in film festivals all over the world. They have won awards including Best Animated Film in the New Hope International Film Festival for their animated feature film Eagle Feather.

Jeanette Harrison is a director, writer, actor, and producer, who has spent most of her career in theater. For television, she co-wrote with Sharmila Devar a half-hour comedy about family and cultural identity, FEATHERS AND DOTS, DOTS AND FEATHERS. She created and was Head Writer for the webseries The Breakdown (3 seasons); and was a staff writer for the webseries Coach Dan. For SPASigma, she was Head Writer and 2^nd Unit Director for their most recent documentary, and a staff writer on Personality Quotient (2018). In 2004 she co-founded the award-winning AlterTheater in the San Francisco Bay Area. At AlterTheater, she architected the ground-breaking AlterLab playwright residency program. She has shepherded more than 20 new plays to world premiere productions. A Native New Yorker, she is of Onondaga descent.

Chag Lowry is of Yurok, Maidu, and Achumawi ancestry from northern California. He is an author, filmmaker, and educator. His most recent publication is the graphic novel titled Soldiers Unknown with art by Rahsan Ekedal. This book was published by Great Oak Press and focuses on the Yurok Native American military experience in World War One. Mr. Lowry has a M.A. in Education and is currently writing a comic anthology titled Reflection.

Vladimir Perez (Taino) is a comedian from Brooklyn NY. As an actor he can be seen in network sitcoms that include Modern Family, Brooklyn Nine Nine, The Unicorn and the upcoming Disney+ show Diary of a Female President. As a writer, Vlad was honored to be a part of the LA SKINS FEST Native American TV writers Lab. Vlad is also a proud recipient of the Groundlings NBC/Universal Diversity scholarship 2018. Vlad’s sketch "Resting Gangster Face" was selected to be filmed for the 2017 IFC Showcase during the San Francisco Sketchfest. At UCB, Vlad hosted the LA Weekly Top Pick show The Hip Hop Source Awardz and performed improv on UCB Mess Hall team Fresh Kicks. He is a proud alumni of the CBS Diversity Showcase as a writer in 2016 and an actor in 2017. Vlad is currently working on an animation series based on a Taino super hero.

Sierra Revis (Yuchi) is a Graphic Designer currently working for the Native-owned marketing agency, Buffalo Nickel Creative based in Pawhuska, OK. Her design work on the Native Now and Indigenous People's Day campaigns was praised by audiences throughout Indian Country. Sierra has also put her video editing and animation skills to work on various documentary-style shorts for a state-wide campaign on commercial tobacco-use cessation and prevention among Native American tribes. A graduate of Oklahoma State University Institute of Technology with a degree in Visual Communications, Sierra recently developed an animated language video and created the story board, illustrated the visuals and animated the components.

Jason Turner (Potawatomi and Kickapoo) is an accomplished filmmaker, producer, editor, and director. A music video he shot and directed won the Art at Work award in 2013 from the Arts Council of Kansas City (ArtsKC). Many of his films have screened at film festivals. His motion comic, The Iron Detective: Sentinel, won the Achievement in Animation award at the 2017 LA Skins Fest and streamed nationally on Xfinity Streampix. Those same shorts have screened at Planet Comicon in Kansas City. Jason has also served on Planet Comicon panels. For four years he ran the Kansas City 48 Hour Film Project (KC's branch of the 48 Hour Film Project). He is also a published comic book author. His comic book "Sentinel" can be found on Amazon and has been made into an animation short, The Iron Detective: Sentinel.

Reclaiming Native Truth: Changing the Narrative

Groundbreaking Research Reveals America’s Attitudes, Public Perceptions and Dominant Narratives about Native People and Native Issues, and Provides Opportunities for “Reclaiming Native Truth”

First Nations Development Institute (First Nations) and Echo Hawk Consulting (EHC) today released groundbreaking research about attitudes toward and perceptions of Native Americans as part of a jointly-managed effort called Reclaiming Native Truth: A Project to Dispel America’s Myths and Misconceptions. The project also released two messaging guides based on the research findings and a narrative-change strategy framework that will be used to begin to change the false and misleading narratives about Native peoples.

The project seeks to create a long-term, Native-led movement that positively transforms popular narratives and images of Native Americans. A two-year phase, launched in 2016, created a solid foundation of unprecedented public opinion research and data, building upon previous research efforts. It was funded by a $2.5 million grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and significant financial contributions from numerous other entities and individuals.

 

“Some incredible findings were unearthed through this research – many of which had long been experienced and assumed but not proven,” said Michael E. Roberts (Tlingit), President & CEO of First Nations. “The findings clearly validate the realities that so many Native people face in their day-to-day interactions in communities. They provide our project, and the larger movement, with a strong foundation upon which to move forward.” Crystal Echo Hawk (Pawnee), President & CEO of Echo Hawk Consulting, shared, “This research informed how we could create a new narrative that would be effective in changing misperceptions. We formulated a new narrative, created by renowned Native American artists and storytellers,  that proved to change people’s understanding of Native people and issues.  We are excited to take this new narrative and our research findings and transition into a new phase of this project, harnessing the power of a movement of movements.”

FINDINGS

Highlights from the publicly available findings include:

• Discrimination: Most Americans surveyed significantly understate the degree of discrimination against Native Americans. Only 34 percent of Americans believe that Native people face discrimination. At the same time, myths about the abundance of Indian gaming and free government benefits to Native Americans are widely held and fuel bias across diverse demographics and within institutions.
• Narratives: The research found that people have limited personal experience with Native Americans but accept pervasive negative narratives that are erroneously set or reinforced by others, and that proximity shapes some perceptions. For instance, people who live near or work in Indian Country, especially in areas of great poverty, are likely to hold significant bias. Only 56% of survey respondents living in close proximity to Native communities believed the U.S. should do more to help Native Americans compared to 64% of respondents further removed.
• Invisibility: Unsurprisingly, another key finding was that Native Americans are assigned to a romanticized past. However, one of the biggest barriers identified was the invisibility and erasure of Native Americans in all aspects of modern U.S. society. Respondents, including members of Congress and administrative officials, agree that invisibility, stereotypes and narratives set by others do impact policy.
• Desire for Complete History: One of the key opportunities uncovered is that, across the research, people are well aware of the inaccurate historical lessons they have learned about Native Americans, and want more accurate education about both historical and contemporary Natives. This was reflected in national polling that indicated that 72 percent believe it is necessary to make significant changes to school curricula on Native American history and culture.

TESTING A NEW NARRATIVE

Narratives are broadly accepted, overarching stories that reinforce ideas, norms and expectations in society. Repeated over and over, through diverse platforms and channels, a narrative becomes the story people accept without question. Often a narrative reinforces the status quo and perpetuates unfair systems, structures and norms. The Reclaiming Native Truth project worked to identify and test a new accurate narrative that can support cultural shifts to advance social and policy change to support racial equity and justice for Native Americans and tribal nations.

• 78% – Most Americans are generally open to hearing this narrative. A majority in this survey say they are interested in learning more about Native American cultures. Strong majorities support Native American positions on most issues — mascots excepted — without hearing the narratives.
• 81% – The public reacts strongly to our narrative.
• 88% – Nearly nine in 10 respondents find it credible.

One of the most significant outcomes of the project related to developing and testing a new strength-based narrative that incorporated messaging related to values, history and the visibility of Native peoples. The narrative was tested through an online survey conducted between April 27 and May 1, 2018, with 2,000 Americans over age 18. Majorities of Americans support the new narrative and find it credible. A 65 percent majority say they would be willing — 31 percent very willing — to share these ideas with others. More issue-specific narrative messages written around key issues — mascots, the Indian Child Welfare Act, tribal sovereignty and pop culture depictions of Native Americans — find similar validation.

Most noteworthy is the objective difference between those exposed to the new narrative (treated group) and those that were not (untreated “control” group). Large differences emerge among the half that read the new narrative, which gave them a framework for understanding information about key Native issues related to the Indian Child Welfare Act, sovereignty, mascots and other issues. For example, 39 percent of Americans who were not exposed to the new narratives support a ban on Native American mascots. Among those who read the narratives, 53 percent support such a ban.

“We are encouraged by the findings of the research and narrative message testing in this first phase,” said Vicky Stott, Program Officer at the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. “As a philanthropic partner to the project, we are committed to telling more authentic and complete stories about who we are as interconnected people living in America. This work has the potential to transform the way we understand and relate to one another and, ultimately, co-create a new story about our shared humanity.”

THE NEXT PHASE

The next phase of work will focus on bringing the power of many movements — of organizations, tribes, grassroots leaders, non-Native allies, foundations — each of whom can adopt, adapt and disseminate the new shared narrative as part of their ongoing efforts and work, while leading implementation of their own priority strategies. An introduction to the narrative and messaging strategies are available as part of the Reclaiming Native Truth messaging guides at www.ReclaimingNativeTruth.com. The detailed research report and the Narrative-Change Strategy are also available online.

Potential allies, supporters and others can partcipate in the movement of movements. The network will contain a support and infrastructure function that will be determined jointly by core organizations working collaboratively on the initiative.  There will be many ways for allies to do their their part to shift the narrative, remove bias and barriers, and achieve the collective vision for the change that is sought: that Native peoples collectively author and powerfully lead a more equitable reality where they fully benefit from and contribute to both Native and American society. Interested partners are encouraged to download the messaging guides from www.ReclaimingNativeTruth.com.

“The project provided us the critical opportunity to begin to assemble an incredible team of not only researchers, but other experts and thought leaders across Indian Country, and both Native and non-Native allies and professionals in the media, the arts, entertainment, politics and education, as well as others who have worked on successful racial narrative change projects,” noted Echo Hawk. “We have the new research foundation built, a cadre of willing and able experts at the ready, and we have the desire and ability to move this project into the next phases where we can begin to shift the narrative.”

Roberts shared, “We have also sought and received input and feedback at every step in the project, from more than 180 stakeholders, including an incredible swath of Indian Country that came together in a new and different way to support these efforts. Their voices are reflected in this project and we are all committed to work together going forward. Native Americans and tribes have faced discrimination and bias at every level of society, institutionally, and within government. They have been held back from reaching their full potential by the negative stereotypes, damaging misperceptions and lack of awareness that prevail within education, the media, entertainment, popular culture, and among thought leaders. Changing that begins now.”

For more information visit: www.ReclaimingNativeTruth.com.

About First Nations Development Institute

For 38 years, using a three-pronged strategy of educating grassroots practitioners, advocating for systemic change, and capitalizing Indian communities, First Nations has been working to restore Native American control and culturally-compatible stewardship of the assets they own – be they land, human potential, cultural heritage or natural resources – and to establish new assets for ensuring the long-term vitality of Native American communities. First Nations serves Native American communities throughout the United States. For more information, visit www.firstnations.org.

About Echo Hawk Consulting
The mission of Echo Hawk Consulting is to help create new platforms, narratives, strategies and investment that can help catalyze transformational change for and by Native Americans. It partners with Native American, philanthropic and diverse multi-sector partners to move hearts and minds and drive institutional, policy and culture change. Founder Crystal Echo Hawk was recently recognized by the National Center for American Indian Economic Development as its 2018 “Native American Woman Business Owner of the Year.” For more information, visit https://www.echohawkconsulting.com.