Department of World Languages & Cultures
Amount Awarded: $7,500
Awarded for 2018-19
Title: Activism and Changemakers: Native and Indigenous Women from the Americas Speak
Funding requested for on-campus visits, including public lectures and inclass interaction, by Native North/South American women changemakers. Unconventional in their activism, they redefine the implied militancy of the word in order to shift and transform our collective social consciousness regarding Indigenous Peoples. Rooted in their native identity, each brings distinct professional training to bear on the subject of human rights, activism, Indigenous Peoples realities, and ways to rethink human existence along sustainable, socially-just lines.
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It has been an exciting semester for my students in the graduate seminar on Indigeneity, Feminism and Activism, as well as the broader community through the American Indian Center at the U. Based on the budget changes requested by the Dee Council, I was able to bring scholars in person and online through zoom meetings to class. The following Latin and North American Native scholars and public intellectuals joined various conversations for public presentations:
- Luz Maria de la Torre Amaguana (Kichwa- UCLA)
- Davina Smith (Diné Executive Director for SLC Air Protectors)
- Donna Loring (Penobscot- Senior Advisor on Tribal Affairs to Maine Governor Mills
- Rebecca Adamson (Cherokee- First Nations Development Institute)
- Adam Coon (Assistant Prof UMN Morris- expert on Nahuat poetry by women)
- Carolina Singer Bloem (expert on Wayuu women’s writing)
Students also read interviews with Indigenous activists from around the Americas who are involved as change makers within their own disciplines. These previously unpublished conversations provided first-hand contact with Native activists in the field, some of whom joined the class.