10 Individuals and Organizations to Follow this Native American Heritage Month
📸: Sarai Pak (Canva.com)
Native peoples are indigenous to the lands we occupy today. Through the creation and development of the United States and Canada, the First Nations were forcibly removed from their lands and severed from cultural traditions and the knowledge of land stewardship. In honor of Native American Heritage Month, we recognize ten Indigenous individuals and organizations who are boldly telling stories, preserving tribal knowledge, and reconnecting more people with the outdoors, through hiking, surfing, running, dancing at powwows, or advocating for the protection of their ancestral water and lands.
Athabascan Adventures
If you’re looking to fill your feed with beautiful landscapes and thoughtful reflections, follow Athabascan adventurer Amanda Mitchell. While she primarily shares photos of Alaskan mountains, glaciers, and forests, she also shares photos and reflections from her journeys across the Lower 48 States.
As original peoples of interior Alaska, her grandparents raised their eleven children in Holy Cross, Alaska on the Yukon River, living off the land, where Amanda now lives with her husband. From an early age, Amanda learned how to harvest berries, fish, and moose with respect for the land, following the traditions of her ancestors. These teachings of gratitude and care for the land have been key lessons that have followed her throughout life and inform the way she travels and shares her experiences.
When Amanda served as an Ambassador for Native Women’s Wilderness, she was often asked “Whose land are we exploring on?” That answer depends on where you are, whether you’re on a scenic hike near your house or camping in a National Park. She encourages everyone to consistently ask that question and learn about the history and culture of the original inhabitants wherever you may be.
Che Jim
📸: Che Jim (self)
Che Jim is a Diné, Odawa, and Nahua entertainer whose lighthearted videos have garnered him 1.8 million followers on TikTok. While his social media presence is more comedic, he has also acted in several dramatic roles. To Che, the two faces of theater, tragedy and comedy, are what create drama, and he finds it easier to bounce between the two when you consider comedy as a sign of resiliency of Native people.
“For the last 500 years, we have endured genocide, assimilation, disease, and relocation as a result of colonization. Our resiliency, to still be here after all that is a huge testament to who we are as people,” Che Jim said. “We have found comfort in our humor to help recapture power within these conversational spaces. Comedy is essential because of what we've gone through. It helps bring down some walls from all people on both sides of the conversation. I've really helped create an understanding for one another because laughter is universal.”
Che Jim first began acting as an extra, but he will be playing his largest role to date in a movie that will be released next year that tells the story of resistance against the Dakota Access Pipeline in 2016. Acting in the film was powerful for Che because he was also at the actual protests for about six months. Living at the protest camp was the closest thing to real freedom he had ever experienced; the resistance camp operated outside of colonial law.
“Everything was provided as a commune and trade and exchange and sharing of stories and knowledge from all different kinds of tribes. Every single federally recognized tribal nation was represented at that camp,” Che Jim said. “To live as the ancestors did, that's something that I don't think many of us will really experience again. We did get a chance to stand for our water, our sovereignty, and our rights. But the camp served well beyond those confines with those subjects and really served as an activation ground to awaken people to the real issues that are facing our planet.”
Conveying that freedom as an actor was no different than the reality for Che, who has seen the film and understands how impactful it will be, especially for people who don’t know the full story of the DAPL resistance and the threat of climate change. The film will be available on an accessible streaming platform next year, and he’s excited for everyone to watch it.
For Native American Heritage Month, Che will be attending the final rally for Walk for Justice: Free Leonard Peltier on November 18 in Washington, DC, which will be featuring performers, artists and public speakers encouraging conversations about issues faced by Indigenous folks. Che extends an invitation to everyone to join him at the rally.
“I think it's a great way to recognize indigenous people in our struggles and our continued resistance towards a simulation and reclaiming our identity. See, as well as working with some other organizations, who are putting together some virtual presentations in regards to how to properly observe, honor and celebrate indigenous culture and heritage in a respectful and accurate way.”
Giiwedein
Activist Giiwedin Indizhinikaaz is an Anishinaabe Two-spirit water protector and biology student from the Leech Lake Nation. Giiwedein, which means Northwind in Ojibwe, is utilizing Tiktok and Instagram to educate the public about culture and issues facing indigenous people. In 2020, he became an active voice in the resistance against the construction of the Line 3 tar sands pipelines and garnered over 400,000 followers on Tiktok. While the pipeline was still constructed, Giiwedin continues to protest the construction of extractive projects that threaten to destroy the land and livelihoods of Indigenous people in modern day Minnesota.
Autumn heralds Manoominike-geezis or wild rice harvesting time; Giiwedin has shared many videos about harvesting Manoomin (wild rice), a sacred food of the Anishinaabeg that only grows in the Great Lakes Region. Giiwedin is currently collaborating with Jim Northrup of the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior and @mn_wetland_defenders to protest the construction of Huber Engineered Woods oriented strand board (OSB) factory, which would have a 750,000 square foot footprint and destroy local wetlands and two eagle nests near White Oak Lake in northern Minnesota.
The Huber OSB factory risks ruining 30,000 acres of wild rice lakes and would cut trees from within a 100-mile radius of the factory, endangering indigenous peoples’ rights to cultural traditions with the land. For more information on this project, visit the Public Lab Fellowship page. As an educator, Giiwedin hopes more people will act to defend the land and water sacred to us all.
Umi IMAN
📸: photo of Umi IMAN by Khadijah Siferllah
For lovers of all forms of dance, follow Umi IMAN, Healing/Dance Practitioner & Indigenous Arts curator. She and twin sister Khadijah Siferllah form dance duo Al’Tawam and Sequoia Ascension, an Atlanta-based organization that utilizes dance as a form of healing expression for Afro and Indigenous people. Umi IMAN and her sister are Muslim and have Black, Caribbean, and Tsalagi (Cherokee) roots, and seek to bridge Atlanta’s segregated Black and Native communities.
“Black and Native liberation are connected to one another,” Umi IMAN said. “So how can we share our movement and our songs and our dances with one another that warm each other up to one another and create that solidarity to enact more change, such as housing, such as all the other issues that aren't separate, but together our communities experience?”
Umi IMAN and her sister were born and raised in an area of South Minneapolis highly concentrated with black folks from various African diasporas and Anishinaabe folks. She went to a predominantly Native middle school, and grew up around powwow dances, but due to anti-blackness within the native community of the time, she didn’t participate. However, she and her sister have been dancers since childhood; Umi IMAN remembers her mother searching for different dance studios for her daughters post 9/11.
“We were turned away from all the studios that we went to. They didn't want to deal with two dark skinned brown girls that are Muslim,” Umi IMAN said. “Our mom was like, ‘It hurts I know. But you are going to focus on what you do have, what is accessible.’ My work as an individual artist is archiving dancers of the African diaspora. I sit with practitioners that have created that genre, I study it, travel for it, perform it, choreograph it, explore in all the ways that you can explore dance. So that is what was accessible as we were kids, and now I have archived 32 dances of the African diaspora.”
Around three years ago, she moved to Georgia to deepen her understanding of self, including her Indigenous language practices. She found a bartering-situation where she exchanged her skills for housing. Ready to pay it forward, she bought a property in 2020 with the intention to create an affordable housing network for Black and Native creatives. The house was built by Edward Johnson, Atlanta’s first Black master electrician and Tuskegee Airman, who hoped his homes would go towards initiatives for affordable housing. Umi IMAN is grateful to be part of his legacy through Sequoia Ascension, which is already accepting applications for two artist residencies for 2023.
For Native American Heritage Month, Sequoia Ascension is partnering with Revolutionary Healing, another Atlanta arts organization built upon Black and Native solidarity, for Fancy Shawl performances and in-person classes. She is also continuing the Rhythmic Conjure series, which began during the pandemic, to highlight Black and Native artists on their Instagram live to dance and speak about their art through weekly sessions.
“We’re just centering movement that native folks are very grateful to be keeping alive,” Umi IMAN said. I’m also acknowledging more of my individual nuance of my indigeneity of being black and native. My grandmother is Afro-Indigenous, and we have that understanding of shared heritage, but it's not necessarily the same, because she's of a lighter complexion. When we go to things people don't question if she belongs. I feel that asking these questions, ‘Who are your specific ancestors? Who is your tribe?’ is essential, but Black natives and Southern natives are most intensely requested. There are more spaces that are being created for Black and Southern Natives by way of Sequoia Ascension, Revolutionary Healing, and others. There are places for us.”
Although she rarely saw people who looked like her in Minnesota powwows, she sees more folks with darker complexion on the East Coast. Within the past five years, she has been on the south and southeast powwow circuits as a jingle dress dancer. This past Indigenous People’s Day celebration, she danced in the red jingle dress special on the Shinnecock reservation.
“Seeing all my Shinnecock sisters owning their dark skin and their regalia just as if, this is just what it is, none of this is new, it definitely informs the way that I walk with more reassurance and boldness,” Umi IMAN said. “To have those reminders in that reflection, it really does make a difference. I think growing up in America, sometimes, it felt like dance and music was the only thing that I had to feel a greater sense of being an identity. I can't really imagine my life without it. It's just that grounding and central for me.”
Native Outdoors
Native Outdoors began in March 2017 as a social media project by Diné native Dr. Len Necefer to highlight the stories of Native folks in the outdoor industry and address the lack of representation. Since then, Native Outdoors has grown to provide consulting services to the outdoor industry with companies such as Eddie Bauer, Smartwool, Ruffwear, and Weston Skis to bring authentic indigenous design and stories into product, and tell award-winning stories through a variety of media.
Native Outdoors is also part of 1 Percent for the Planet, which means 1% of their annual sales goes toward supporting the environment, which they consider essential as a Native-owned gear company to protect the places of cultural heritage.
This year on Indigenous People’s Day, they partnered with Ikon Pass to announce the Ikon Pass Scholarship, which will grant passes, a ski or snowboard lesson, and gear to 13 Indigenous people to reduce barriers to access for outdoor winter sports for the 22/23 season. Traveling through the snow via ski has been a hallmark of many Indigenous cultures’ connection with land from China to the Aleutian islands of Alaska. The Ikon Pass grants ski days at 50 destinations around the world; 15 mountains offer unlimited access. The scholarship recipients will be announced November 11.
Hailey Hamelin Wilson
Hailey Hamelin-Wilson is a Cree woman, university student, pageant queen, model, and activist for women's rights. Her online presence on TikTok and Instagram showcases Indigenous beauty, history, dance, and culture. In 2021, at 19 years old, she was crowned Miss Globe Canada as the first indigenous representative. At Miss Globe 2021 in Albania, she placed fourth runner-up against 49 other representatives.
Hamelin-Wilson grew up in Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation in Alberta, Canada where she has competed powwow dances and designed moccasins since she was 12 years old. She dances Fancy Shawl as her special skill in pageants. In May 2022, she danced Jingle dress at the unveiling of a monument dedicated to Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women. Indigenous women face a disproportionate rate of violent crime; nearly 1,200 indigenous women were murdered or reported missing between 1980 and 2012, according to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. However, the number is likely to be much higher, according to advocates like Hamelin-Wilson.
In 2021, Hailey also participated in the training program TikTok Accelerator for Indigenous Creators, designed to empower storytellers by giving them the tools to amplify their online presence. As a university student, she hopes to retell history from an indigenous perspective to future generations. She is currently exploring her own cultural heritage, a blend of Cree on her mother’s side, and Métis (a mix of European and First Nations ancestry), and Ojibwe ancestry on her father’s side.
Verna Volker
If you asked Verna Volker in 2009 if she could ever attempt to run 100 miles, she would have laughed. But as the founder of Native Women Running, she has accomplished 5K’s, half-marathons, marathons, ultras, and 100K’s. A member of the Navajo Nation who grew up in Dzilnaoodilii, New Mexico and now lives with her husband and three boys in Minneapolis, Verna began running to lose weight, but its meaning changed for her after she finished her first race.
“That race, in August of 2009 was a half marathon that I finished. I remember, I was still heavy,” Verna said. “But I finished that race, and when I finished that race, I was like, ‘I can do this running thing.’ So that's when it just sparked me to run and feel I can do this, and I've done marathons, half marathons, five K's to now become an ultra. I can't believe I'm here.”
Running is more than physical training for Vern. She runs in honor of people, especially in honor of the three siblings and parents she has lost in the years. Before a race, she usually puts their name on her shoes. Verna runs to heal and running has become her personal healing journey.
“When the race gets hard in those moments when I'm running in the dark or I feel really tired, I always feel this presence telling me to keep going, and it's very emotional,” Verna said. “That’s what pushes me forward. I truly believe it in my heart. Those moments in my mind of switching gears, when I hurt at certain places, I put them in the front of my mind saying “I can do this.”
As Verna has continued her running journey and formed a community with Native Women Running, she has come to understand the importance of home and roots. She’s excited to host events with Native Women Running and spend time with family this Native American Heritage Month.
“Where we come from is key for me. I think I didn't realize that until I lived far away from my homeland,” Verna said. “But now when I go home, I embrace every part, like the smell of the sage, the beauty of that huge sky. Having the food and being with my family is just so much more meaningful.”
Native Women Running
Native Women Running is an organization that showcases indigenous women who participate in races across the country. After Verna Volker began her journey as a runner around 2018, she realized she would often see personal accounts of native women running 5ks and Ultras, but no one was sharing stories about these women.
“I wanted to create a space for women that was positive and uplifting, and to show that they were represented in this space as well,” Verna said. “When I started, I just had a few native runners, but we just hit 30k on our Instagram and I’m really proud of it because I don’t have any paid advertisements or followers. It's just grown organically, and a majority of the people who are following us are Native people and Native women. I am just in awe of where I am now.”
Native Women Running also forms teams of Native Women who are running in 5ks, marathons, and ultras. Verna reaches out to race directors to share the contacts of any registered Native women runners and then sends them an application through NWR to form a team. She also shares upcoming races so runners can apply and get to know each other.
“So far, we've had 10 teams, [including a team in] the Boston Marathon,” Verna said. “We have some runners out in Vancouver and Toronto, who are getting to know each other on a personal level, and then they're saying, ‘Hey, I live in this area. Do you want to meet and run?’ It’s been really cool how that sisterhood in that community has built among our native women.”
For Native American Heritage Month, NWR is hosting a virtual event called Run the Land during Thanksgiving week where everyone acknowledges who they are as a native people going on a run. NWR also has a partnership with sock company Lily Trotters, featuring a sock for NWR with proceeds that will go towards the organization.
“I lead this all by myself, I really try my best to stay balanced on what I can handle, keep my mission simple and move forward,” Verna said. “It's just a celebration of who we are, just showing our existence today. Because oftentimes, people don't realize that they can talk about us in the past, like we're gone, when that is the month to show that we are here doing things that we are working in different areas. We're building community, we're acknowledging who we are in running. I think that's just what it means to me, just being proud of who we are, of our culture, of our tribe.”
Deanne Hupfield
Deanne Hupfield is an Anishinaabe speaker, educator, and dance course teacher reconnecting Indigenous women to powwow dance. She is the host of the viral YouTube video “How to Dance Powwow,” among other powwow dance tutorial videos, and offers a digital Jingle Dress Making course on her website for Indigenous people who would like to reconnect with their culture and design their own regalia while engaging with community through monthly digital sewing circles.
As the child of a survivor of the Sixties Scoop, in which Native children were forcibly removed from their homes and placed in residential schools, she and her mother were disconnected from the knowledge of Powwow dances and dressmaking. But when Deanne attended her first powwow at Fort William Gardens in Thunder Bay at the age of six, she was mesmerized by the beauty of these spinning, dancing women. Her mother encouraged her to follow them, and since then, Deanne has been an avid dancer.
Deanne grew up in different foster homes in Thunder Bay, Ontario, and she found dance to be a space of great healing and self-expression. She began teaching powwow dance as a teenager and attended fashion school at George Brown College to learn how to make Regalia herself. She has worked with the Toronto District School Board to support Indigenous students and ran a Powwow club for elementary students. She has also taught powwow dance and mentored youth at the Native Canadian Centre of Toronto for over 10 years.
Native Like Water
Native Like Water (NLW) reconnects indigenous teens and adult public in California and across the Americas to sacred relationships to the water through curated experiences that focus on adventure travel, surf, food, and music. Participants from California, Panama, Jamaica, Mexico, and Hawaii experience immersion programs that focus on holistic wellness and “Indigenizing education.
Marc Chavez, who is of Mexican-American Indian, (Nahua, Michoacán and New Mexican-Spanish) descent, founded NLW in 2015 to explore the roots of indigenous maritime culture of Southern California. Through an invitation by the Polynesian Voyage Society’s Na Kama Kai Youth water mentorship program, seven tribal youth, four mentors, and one elder from SoCal visited Native Hawaii. They returned with lessons in science and culture to SoCal, whose native Kumeyaay, Luiseno, Diegeno, Acjachemen, Tongva, Chumash, Cahuilla and Yuman peoples all have ancient relationships with water.
Now, their wide range of programs and fellowships focus on self-sustainability, environmental science, food sovereignty, canoe, scuba, and surf. NLW also offers full and partial scholarships for participants between the ages of 17 and 35 for those who are in need.