Native America Calling

Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve (Sicangu Lakota and Ponca) mistook her first interaction with racism — a separate gas station outhouse reserved for “Indians” — as a privileged courtesy for her and her people. It is one of the “Special Places, Sacred Circles” that she recalls in the account of her life on the dry, windy plains of South Dakota. She tells of the Great Depression, grandmothers who taught her the power of words, and the navigation of a literary world that embraced her. Sneve was one of the first authors to offer an alternative to children’s literature flush with stereotypes. Her insightful writing took her from her home along Ponca Creek to a presidential honor at the White House. We’ll hear Sneve talk about her life as a writer and public school educator.



Break 1 Music:  Song of Encouragement (song) Porcupine Singers (artist) Alowanpi – Songs of Honoring – Lakota Classics: Past & Present, Vol. 1 (album)

Break 2 Music: Elle Danse [Boogat Remix] (song) Mimi O’Bonsawin (artist)

A recent agreement between a gold mining company and the Shoshone Paiute Tribes of the Duck Valley Reservation is being called “historic” by its chairman. The mining company president says the agreement follows the standards set by the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and gives the tribe a share of the profits from the mine. The company and tribal officials are optimistic this will set a precedent for how mining companies partner with tribes.

At the same time as the agreement, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposes to severely limit the power of tribes to interfere with construction of oil and natural gas pipelines and resource-guzzling data centers.

GUESTS

Chairman Brian Mason (Shoshone Paiute)

Maranda Compton (Delaware Tribe of Indians), founder and president of Lepwe

Kate Finn (Osage), founder and director of the Tallgrass Institute

James Grijalva, professor of law at the University of North Dakota School of Law

Melissa Kay, Tribal Water Institute fellow at the Native American Rights Fund



Break 1 Music: Healing Song (song) Judy Trejo (artist) Circle Dance Songs of the Paiute and Shoshone (album)

Break 2 Music: Elle Danse [Boogat Remix] (song) Mimi O’Bonsawin (artist)

In Los Angeles, Chicago, and now Minneapolis, activists, community leaders, and concerned neighbors have organized loose-knit networks of support for what they believe will be a protracted resistance effort against the crackdowns by federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers. The Powwow Grounds Coffeehouse in Minneapolis is among the locations collecting food, cash, and other support for those filling the streets with whistles, drums, and their own voices. Doing so carries risk. ICE agents shot and killed one person. Many more are injured. At least one Minneapolis restaurant fended off ICE agents who attempted to enter. We’ll hear from Native organizers in cities around the country about what they expect in the weeks and months ahead.

GUESTS

Robert Rice (White Earth Nation), owner of Pow Wow Grounds

Courtney Cochran (Anishinaabe), artist, filmmaker, and community organizer

Jennifer Marley (San Ildefonso), community organizer and a member of the Total Sovereignty Working Group

Eva Cardenas (Mexica Chicana of Mazahua and Zapotec descent), director of organizing for the NDN Collective, the LANDBACK action network

Joel Garcia (Huichol), artist, cultural organizer, and director of Meztli Projects



Break 1 Music: Hope [Featuring Werner Erb] (song) Sihasin (artist) Never Surrender (album)

Break 2 Music: Elle Danse [Boogat Remix] (song) Mimi O’Bonsawin (artist)

The village of Kwigillingok, Alaska is at a crossroads after flooding, fueled by a serious Bearing Sea storm, washed away 50 houses, killing three residents. The storm is one of the increasingly frequent and increasingly severe storms to pummel the area. Combined with thawing permafrost and rising sea levels, village leaders are pushing to move — a plan that state and Native regional corporation officials reject.

Recent flooding in Washington State also has tribal officials assessing their options. There too, major flooding — what used to be a once-in-a-lifetime event — threatens residents’ lives and property and the natural viability of the rivers than once sustained life for local tribes.

We’ll get updates about the effects of increasing floods and the difficult choices tribal officials face.

GUESTS

Daniel Paul (Yup’ik), tribal president for the Village of Kipnuk

Gavin Phillip (Yup’ik), tribal administrator for the Village of Kwigillingok

Darrel John (Yup’ik), community school advocate

Joseph Pavel (Skokomish), director of natural resources for the Skokomish Indian Tribe

Guillaume Mauger, Washington state climatologist and research scientist at the University of Washington Climate Impacts Group



Break 1 Music: Uangilaa (song) Susan Aglukark (artist) The Crossing (album)

Break 2 Music: Elle Danse [Boogat Remix] (song) Mimi O’Bonsawin (artist)

This year is the 60th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the federal law that promised equal access to voting regardless of race or religion. The document was a milestone in the movement championed by Martin Luther King, Jr. Among the actions that prompted the legislation was a series of violent confrontations between protestors and officials intent on preventing their progress, including law enforcement officers’ attack on hundreds of marchers on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala. Many civil rights advocates say the country is now dismantling the progress that King devoted his life to that has helped Native Americans and so many others.

GUESTS

Dr. Sandy Grande (Quechua), professor of political science and Native American and Indigenous Studies at the University of Connecticut

Nick Tilsen (Oglala Lakota), founder and CEO of the NDN Collective

Wenona Singel (Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians)

Caroline LaPorte (Little River Band of Ottawa Indians descendant), staff attorney with the Indian Law Resource Center and associate judge for the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians



Break 1 Music: Leadership Song [Naaí’áanii Biyiin] (song) Radmilla Cody (artist) K’é Hasin (album)

Break 2 Music: Elle Danse [Boogat Remix] (song) Mimi O’Bonsawin (artist)