There are traditionally three Plenaries held during the MALCS Summer Institute. The MALCS Executive Committee organizes one of the Plenaries, the Summer Institute Site Committee organizes one and the third one is organized by the Site Committee in conjunction with the Women’s Indigenous Native Caucus (WINC).
Plenaries are public events and all are welcome to attend as they are important spaces for coming together as a community during the Summer Institute.
August 4th, 1:30 – 3:00 pm, Room A & B – Gateway Center
In the Shadow of Hegemony: Discourses on Gender, Trauma, ICWA, and Cultural Appropriation
Gender Trauma Issues Affecting Incarcerated Women of Color
Lisa M. Calderón is the Director of the Community Reentry Project, an initiative of the City of Denver’s Crime Prevention and Control Commission, where she supervises six staff who work on behalf of formerly incarcerated persons for their successful reintegration back into the community. She is an adjunct faculty member for CU Denver’s Ethnic Studies Department and has taught in academia for more than fifteen years in the areas of Women’s Studies, Sociology, and Criminal Justice. She holds a Master’s degree, law degree, and is currently working on her doctorate in education.
As a former legal director of an abused women’s program, Lisa was qualified as an expert witness on issues of domestic violence and victim advocacy, and had her opinions profiled in the media. Lisa has more than twenty years of facilitation experience in the areas of inclusiveness, gender equity, and ethical communication.
As an active community member, Lisa is involved with several community-based initiatives including Co-Chair of the Colorado Latino Forum Denver Chapter to create more opportunities for marginalized women, low-income communities, youth of color, and justice system involved persons.
Lisa’s intersecting identities as a Black Latina enhances her facilitation skills by incorporating experiences and insights from multiple lenses. Raised by a teenage mother, Lisa is the great-grand daughter of Mexican immigrants and granddaughter of a migrant farm worker. Lisa began her social justice activism at the age of five, protesting on the picket-lines during the United Farm Workers Movement. She has won several awards for her inspirational leadership.
Standing Our Ground: The Indian Child Welfare Act
Nicky Kay Michael, PhD is a Visiting Professor at the University of Wyoming where she teaches Native American, Women’s Studies, and History courses. She is also a Tribal Council member of the Delaware Tribe of Indians, located in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. She received a B.A. in American Studies and Race and Ethnicity from Stanford University, an M.A. in History from Oklahoma State University, and a PhD in History from the University of Oklahoma. Dr. Michael has been a life-long advocate for her Lenape people, language, and culture. Additionally, she is an activist. She organizes and advocates on behalf of the Indian Child Welfare Act, and murdered and missing Indigenous women and girls, as well as assists tribal members who seek to make changes in their local and national communities. In 2010, she co-founded the Lenapeowsi Foundation, which educates and instructs Native American children about their identity and cultures. She currently serves as Chairwoman of the Board.
Dr. Michael has spent most of her life participating in many Native American cultural and ceremonial activities. She shakes shells for Stomp Dances in Oklahoma as well as Fancy Shawl and Cloth dances in powwows. Additionally, she runs in marathons and participates in Ironman Triathlons.
Owning Red: A Theory of Indian (Cultural) Appropriation
Kristen Carpenter (Cherokee) is the Council Tree Professor of Law at the University of Colorado Law School, where her research focuses on the legal claims of indigenous peoples, especially with respect to issues of property, religion, culture, and human rights. Her articles have been published in the Yale Law Journal, California Law Review, Texas Law Review, UCLA Law Review, Fordham Law Review and others. Professor Carpenter is also active in pro bono work on American Indian cultural and religious freedoms. She is a graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School.
At Colorado Law, Professor Carpenter teaches courses in Property, Cultural Property, American Indian Law, and Indigenous Peoples in International Law. Professor Carpenter has been awarded the Provost’s Award for Faculty Achievement and the Outstanding New Faculty Award. She served as a director of the American Indian Law Program from 2012-2014, as Associate Dean for Faculty Development from 2011-2013, and as Associate Dean for Research from 2014-2015.
Before entering academia, Carpenter clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit and was an associate attorney at Hill & Barlow, P.C. in Boston. She gained experience in Indian law as a clerk for the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation and at the law firms of Fredericks, Pelcyger, Hester & White and Sonosky, Chambers, Sachse, Miller & Munson. Professor Carpenter previously served on the boards of the Federal Bar Association’s Indian Law Section and Colorado Indian Bar Association. She is a member of the American Law Institute and an Adviser on the ALI’s Restatement of Indian Law Project.
August 5th, 1:30 – 3:00 pm, Room A & B – Gateway Center
Dr. Dolores Delgado Bernal
Dolores Delgado Bernal is Professor of Education and Ethnic Studies at the University of Utah. Her scholarship addresses Chicana/Latina feminist methodologies and pedagogies, educational (in)equity, and educational pathways. Her 10-year ethnographic work with the Westside Pathways Project, a university-school-community K-16 partnership that addresses the under-representation of Latin@ students in higher education, works directly with K-16 students, parents, and schools to create educational opportunities and college-going expectations. She is co-editor of Chicana/Latina Testimonios as Pedagogical, Methodological and Activist Approaches to Social Justice (2016) and of Chicana/Latina Education in Everyday Life: Feminista Perspectives on Pedagogy and Epistemology (2006). Some of her awards include the MALCS Tortuga Award, American Educational Research Association¹s Distinguished Scholar Award, and the Critical Race Studies Association¹s Derrick Bell Legacy Award. She is a daughter of Josie Delgado and John Bernal, mother to three school-aged boys, and life partner to Dr. Octavio Villalpando.
Dr. Jeanette Haynes Writer
Dr. Jeanette Haynes Writer is Tsalagi (a citizen of Cherokee Nation); her home is in northeastern Oklahoma. Even though she works in New Mexico, she returns home often to take care of her parents, re-center herself on the land, and maintain her connection to and recognition in her tribal community. Dr. Haynes Writer joined the Department of Curriculum and Instruction faculty at New Mexico State University in 1996 and was the first Native American faculty member hired in the College of Education. Starting at NMSU as a beginning assistant professor, she was promoted to full professor in 2016. She recently returned to faculty from serving as department head (4 years) and associate department head (2 years). Her courses have included undergraduate and graduate courses in multicultural education, as well as courses focused on curriculum and pedagogy. She also developed and taught the College’s first Indigenous Education course. Dr. Haynes Writer’s research interests and scholarly publications are in the areas of Tribal Critical Race Theory, critical multicultural teacher education, social justice education, and Indigenous education.
Dr. Jennie Luna
Dr. Jennie Luna was born and raised in East San José, California. Granddaughter/Daughter of migrant farm workers and cannery workers, she is first in her family to attend and graduate college. She received her undergraduate degree in Chicana/o Studies and Mass Communications from U.C. Berkeley, a Masters in Education from Teachers College, Columbia University, and a Ph.D. in Native American Studies from U.C. Davis. She is currently an Assistant Professor in Chicana/o Studies at California State University, Channel Islands. Dr. Luna’s research focuses on the contemporary history of Danza Mexica/Azteca tradition and its impact on Xicana Indígena identity politics. As a danzante for over twenty years, Dr. Luna presents an ethnographic perspective and addresses the diaspora of Danza in the U.S. Dr. Luna’s research incorporates Nahuatl language study, representations of Indigeneity, Indigenous women’s reproductive rights, traditional birthing methods and reproductive justice. Her work has been published in Border-Lines, the journal of the Latino Research Center at the University of Nevada, Reno, and Diálogo published by the Center for Latino Research, DePaul University in Chicago. This latter piece, entitled, “La Tradición Conchera: The Historical Process of Danza and Catholicism” was awarded the 2014 Antonia I. Castañeda Prize at the National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies.
August 6th, 1:30 – 3:00 pm, Ballroom A – Union
WINC PLENARY PANEL: Caring for Our Communities: Culture and Tradition as a Pathway to Healing
Elicia Goodsoldier
Elicia Goodsoldier is an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation and also belongs to the Spirit Lake Dakota Tribe. She Co-Chairs the Denver American Indian Commission and recently completed an appointment to the Governor’s Commission to Study American Indian Representations in Public Schools. She is a board member of the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition and sits on the Cultural Competency Advisory Council for the Colorado Department of Human Services, Division of Behavioral Health. She is the program coordinator for PERL (People Engaged in Raising Leaders), a program under the Community Action Programs, Boulder County.
Title: Understanding Historical Trauma and Implications for Healing our Tribal Communities.
Many tribal communities across the United States are returning to their cultural and spiritual practices as a way to mitigate the post traumatic response of our young people, especially young American Indian women. When you consider the high rates of domestic violence, sexual and physical trauma as well as suicidal ideations among our young American Indian women, it is equally important to understand the root of these psychosocial issues. There is a dire need to create awareness of the importance and efficacy of traditional and spiritual healing within our Native communities and it is equally important for non-native behavioral health care providers to understand this. My approach is one that encourages tribal and urban Indian communities to look at their own healing. I encourage exploration of past and present trauma and its impacts in the communities, adding observations of cutting edge neuroscience, and weaving in traditional healing elements as possible tools available to tribal communities. Considering there are 566 very distinct tribal communities, we will look at what the Tiospaye Sakowin (Seven Families) Education and Healing Center, a grassroots youth and family serving organization on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, is doing to help their community heal from past and current traumas.
Kellie Webb
Kellie Webb is the Clinical Director of the Eastern Shoshone Recovery Program, a position she has held since 2008. She has worked in the addictions field for eighteen years with a brief intermission of five years, where she worked in the Student Support Program at Central Wyoming College.
Kellie is the mother of three beautiful daughters: Hattie, Kaitlin, and Sadie. She is the daughter of James Webb, Scottish heritage and Lorraine Cottenoir Webb, Eastern Shoshone Woman and the granddaughter of Leo E. Cottenoir- Cowlitz Indian (Washington State) and Ethel Harris Cottenoir-Eastern Shoshone Woman. Her grandparents met each other at Chemawa Indian Boarding School in the early 1930s. As her grandfather tells the story: “I met a beautiful Shoshone girl at Chemawa , fell in love and would follow her anywhere…even to Wyoming” – which he did, and raised three children. She grew up in Riverton, Wyoming and has lived on the Wind River Reservation the majority of her life, except for seven years when she attended college in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and a short stint of “experiencing” California for three years. Kellie is an enrolled Cowlitz member and Shoshone blood, growing up with Shoshone relatives. She has two sisters, one brother, and one deceased brother. She is the middle child of her family and embraces that role. Kellie is a woman living in recovery – celebrating 24 years sober. She works in the recovery field and appreciates the blessing of those people who are living that life and champions those who are moving in that journey. Kellie is looking forward to the MALCS discussion.
Title: Co-occurring Group Process Treatment Approach Embedded in a Core Cultural Value System
The Eastern Shoshone Recovery Program provides outpatient treatment to individuals seeking to arrest substance use disorders combined with mental health issues. The programming treatment approach is based in our Cultural Values and the Medicine Wheel tradition of healing. The program has translated Western treatment processes and applied those practices within those Cultural Values. The presentation will demonstrate the program’s client centered/strength based system of care.
Sunny Goggles
Sunny Goggles is the Director of the White Buffalo Recovery Center and an Advisor for the Wind River UNITY Council, a council that focuses on empowering the youth on the Wind River Reservation. Sunny’s previous positions include Project Coordinator for Women Restored and Coordinator for the Shosone and Arapaho Tribe Substance Abuse Court. Her commitment to youth, women, and the health of those that reside on the Wind River Reservation is evidenced through her career. Sunny has spoken before the U.S. Senate Indian Affair Committee on issues related to poverty, health, and well-being on her reservation, while simultaneously noting the beauty that exists in her homeland.
Title: Utilizing Culture as a Resource in Recovery from Substance Abuse
Abstract: This presentation will review how the Northern Arapaho Tribe’s White Buffalo Recovery Center incorporates culture and tradition into substance abuse recovery services. The Northern Arapaho Tribe is blessed with a rich foundation of holistic based healing and wellness. The program utilizes this resource in outpatient treatment and recovery support services.
