Indigenous Politics: From Native New England and Beyond

Episode #1: IRS seizes and auctions Crow Creek Sioux Land
Join your host, J. Kehaulani Kauanui, for an episode that features Brandon J. Sazue, Sr., Chairman of Crow Creek Sioux Tribe. He will discuss the politics of the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) auctioning off 7,100 acres of tribal land on December 3, 2009 to recover $3,123,789.73 dollars it claims is unpaid employment taxes. Chairman Sazue has been occupying the land since December 7th; he is currently camped in a travel trailer on the land in sub-zero temperatures and invites supporters and people from all nations to join him in the struggle.
Original air-date: 1-12-10.

Episode #2: Joseph Nicolar, The Life and Traditions of the Red Man
Join your host, J. Kehaulani Kauanui, for an exploration of a 1893 book, The Life and Traditions of the Red Man, written and self-published by Joseph Nicolar (Penobscot Nation). Nicolar (1827-94) was an elder and political leader of the Penobscot Nation of Maine. He served six terms as the tribe’s elected representative to the Maine State Legislature. A rediscovered treasure of work, The Life and Traditions of the Red Man tells the story of his people from the first moments of creation to the earliest arrivals and eventual settlement of Europeans. The book is one of the few sustained narratives in English composed by a member of an Eastern Algonquian-speaking people during the nineteenth century, which was written by Nicolar in an urgent effort to pass on Penobscot cultural heritage to subsequent generations of the tribe and to reclaim Native Americans’ right to self-representation. The guests on the show will include scholar Annette Kolodny, who edited and annotated the text for re-release with a History of the Penobscot Nation and a full introduction to the work, and esteemed elder Charles Norman Shay (Penobscot Nation). Original air-date: 1-26-10.

Episode #3: Coal Controversy and the Northern Cheyenne Tribe
Join your host for an episode that examines a controversial plan to mine coal on lands adjacent to the Northern Cheyenne Tribe’s reservation. Southeast of Ashland, MT in Powder River County, the Otter Creek Coal Tracts contain more than 1.2 billion acres of unmined coal, half of which is part of Montana school trust land. In December 2009, the State Land Board voted (4-1) to call for bids on the coal. This week the answers to call for Otter Creek bids will be in, and both proponents and opponents will learn more about the market for this huge coal reserve. All three guests on the show are opposed this plan: Steve Brady (Northern Cheyenne Tribe), Chairman of the Northern Cheyenne Cultural Commission; and Alexis Bonogofsky, Senior Coordinator of the Tribal Lands Conservation Program of the National Wildlife Federation; and Philip Whiteman (Northern Cheyenne Tribe), co-founder of Yellow Bird, a Native non-profit organization. Original air-date: 2-09-2010

Episode #4: Vermont’s Legacy of Coerced Sterilization
Join your host, J. Kehaulani Kauanui, for an episode that focuses on a proposal being considered by the Vermont legislature to apologize for its 1931 Sterilization Act, which was part of a eugenics campaign that targeted persons of French Canadian and Abenaki ancestry, as well as other non-Anglos and individuals deemed mentally disabled. Our guests on the program include Nancy Gallagher, author of Breeding Better Vermonters: The Eugenics Project in the Green Mountain State, and Judy Dow (Abenaki) who sits on the Vermont Commission on Native American Affairs. Original air-date: 2-23-10.

Episode #5:Tribal Sovereignty Part I: Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation
Join your host, J. Kehaulani Kauanui, for an episode of “Indigenous Politics” that features two talks from a recent panel on tribal sovereignty held at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center. Listeners will hear: John Echohawk (Pawnee) give a legal and historical overview of tribal sovereignty based on his work at the Native American Rights Fund; and J. Cedric Woods (Lumbee) discuss cultural sovereignty, and what sovereignty still means to tribes who have either been denied federal recognition, not received it, or been “terminated.” John Echohawk (member of the Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma) was a co-founder of the Native American Rights Fund in 1970 and has been its Executive Director since 1977. The Native American Rights Fund has been involved in most of the major Indian rights litigation since 1970. In 1992, he served on the Clinton-Gore transition team for the Department of the Interior and in 2008 he served on the Obama-Biden transition team for the Department of the Interior. J. Cedric Woods, Ph.D. (citizen of the Lumbee tribe of North Carolina), combines over a decade of tribal government experience with research and currently serves as the interim director for the Institute for New England Native American Studies at the University of Massachusetts-Boston. He has served in a variety of capacities for the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation, including: Director of Career Development, Research Analyst, Tribal Government Spokesman, and Deputy Chief Operating Officer. Original air-date: 3-23-10.

Episode #6: Tribal Sovereignty Part II: Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation
Join your host, J. Kehaulani Kauanui, for Part II of a two-part episode featuring a panel on tribal sovereignty held at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center. The show features three panelists who specifically focus on issues facing the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation: Betsy Conway an attorney in the Office of Legal Counsel for the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation; James T. Jackson, the Tribal Council Treasurer of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribe; and Jackson T. King, Jr., General Counsel of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation. Listeners will learn about a variety of legal and social issues relating to tribal governance including: assisting the Tribe’s Judicial Committee in drafting legislation; working with various tribal regulatory bodies including the Gaming Commission and the Mashantucket Employment Rights Office; and representing the Tribal Nation in various jurisdictional challenges including those related to taxation, labor and employment issues, and enforcement of tribal court judgments. Original air-date: 3-23-10.

Episode #7: Shattered Hearts: the commercial sexual exploitation of American Indian women and girls in Minnesota
Join your host, J. Kehaulani Kauanui, for an episode that focuses on a groundbreaking 2009 research report Shattered Hearts: the commercial sexual exploitation of American Indian women and girls in Minnesota that was commissioned by the Minnesota Indian Women’s Resource Center (MIWRC) of Minneapolis, MN. The release of the Shattered Hearts report has generated national interest from legislators, policy makers and Tribal communities. Believed to be the first research in the country analyzing the scope of sexual exploitation against American Indians, the report provides a springboard to action for addressing widespread sexual victimization. The guests on the program will be: Dr. Alexandra (Sandi) Pierce, the principal investigator and author of Shattered Hearts, who is currently the senior consultant for Othayonih Research and Evaluation Services LLC; and Suzanne Koepplinger, M.A., the Executive Director of the Minnesota Indian Women’s Resource Center. The MIWRC is a 25 year old social service non-profit that provides direct service and empowering resources to American Indian families so that they can achieve a better quality of life. These services address the multiple issues impacting the Indian community, including homelessness, poverty, addictions, domestic and sexual violence, and need for family and children’s services. Original air-date: 4-12-10.

Episode #8: Indigenous Implications of Arizona SB 1070
Join your host, J. Kehaulani Kauanui for an episode focused on the implications for indigenous people(s) of the recent passage of Arizona State legislation SB 1070, which makes it a crime under state law to be in the country illegally, and requires local law enforcement to question people about their immigration status if there is reason to suspect they are in the country illegally. How does this new law affect those who are Native? Our guests on the show today include Jose R. Matus (Yaqui), Director, Indigenous Alliance Without Borders (Alianza Indigena Sin Fronteras), and Alex Soto (Tohono O’odham Nation) from O’odham Solidarity Across Borders Collective. At the center of a critical indigenous perspective on the new legislation is the recognition that the US nation’s boundaries are not tribal boundaries. This has dire consequences for the many tribal nations, especially those whose traditional lands divided by the US-Mexico border. In other words, those who are also seriously impacted by this offensive law descend from peoples who lived in the Sonoran Desert centuries the existence of the United States. Original air-date: 5-11-10.

Episode #9: Interview with Robert Warrior
Join your host, J. Kehaulani Kauanui, for an episode that features an interview with Professor Robert Warrior (enrolled member of the Osage Nation), Director of American Indian Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He is first and current President of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association, and the author of several books: The People and the Word: Reading Native Nonfiction, American Indian Literary Nationalism (with Craig Womack and Jace Weaver). Like a Hurricane: The Indian Movement from Alcatraz to Wounded Knee (with Paul Chaat Smith) and Tribal Secrets: Recovering American Indian Intellectual Traditions. Topics for discussion will include his concept of “intellectual sovereignty,” the Osage National Editorial Board and the free press, his endorsement of the US Campaign for the Academic & Cultural Boycott of Israel, Palestine and Edward Said, American Indian activism, the co-founding of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association and its upcoming conference in Arizona in the wake of the passage of SB 1070 (a bill that authorizes police to racial profile the general population for undocumented people) and HB 2281 (a bill banning ethnic studies). Original air-date: 5-18-10.

Episode #10: Native Youth and Sexual Health
Join your host, J. Kehaulani Kauanui for an interview with Jessica Yee (Mohawk), the founder and Executive Director of the Native Youth Sexual Health Network, an organization by youth and for youth. The Native Youth Sexual Health Network (NYSHN) is a North-America wide organization working on issues of healthy sexuality, cultural competency, youth empowerment, reproductive justice, and sex positivity by and for Native youth. Jessica Yee is currently serving as the first inaugural Chair of the National Aboriginal Youth Council at the Canadian Aboriginal AIDS Network, as well as the International Indigenous HIV/AIDS Working Group, and she is also the first North American youth representative at MenEngage International Alliance for Gender Equality. She is the 2009 recipient of the YWCA Young Woman of Distinction award, a 2009/2010 Role Model for the National Aboriginal Health Organization, and was recently named one of 20 International Women’s Health Heroes by Our Bodies/Our Blog and one of the Toronto Star’s People to Watch for 2010. Original air-date: 6-8-10.