We are excited to announce that on Friday, April 13, 2012 the Native American Studies Graduate Student Association will host the 1st Annual Native American Studies Graduate Student Symposium. This year’s symposium theme is “Engaging the Indigenous Americas.” In efforts to build interdisciplinary dialogue and promote scholarship and activism that will benefit our Academic and Native communities, we welcomed proposals from all current UC Davis graduate students whose research critically addresses the issues, concerns, and lives of Indigenous peoples of the Americas.

There is often discussion of the importance of interdisciplinary approaches to Indigenous research, but we wanted to see what that would actually look like in practice. Our vision was to find out who was studying Native communities, histories, languages, and practices on campus so we could start talking. Our hope was and is to not only make networks for future collaborations but to form a larger community on the UC Davis campus, bringing together graduate students with a sense of investment in the betterment of the lives and peoples of the Indigenous Americas. In the future, we hope to expand the symposium to include other UC campuses and community members. For now, by sticking to the Davis campus we are afforded the opportunity and experience of putting together a more manageably-sized symposium for the first time around, which was both rewarding and challenging.

We are grateful to the Department of Native American Studies for co-hosting this unique event. Professors Inés Hernández-Avila, Martha Macri, and Hulleah Tsinhnahjinnie were also very supportive and their participation adds a level of awesomeness to our program. Many others also answered the call for symposium planning, especially Tina Tansey and Stella Mancillas whose dedication to NAS student and department projects never wavers. Brook Colley, Cutcha Risling Baldy, Angel Hinzo, and Matthew Casey all worked hard to secure funding and without them this event would not be possible. Cutcha’s experience and expertise brought a much-needed sense of organization and confidence to this project. Brook’s suggestion to video record panels in order to create an archive allows us to share our work beyond our campus and we hope to post those as they become available. History Ph.D. candidate Ryan Tripp’s enthusiasm to join our project made it abundantly clear that the need for interdepartmental collaboration is both necessary and urgent on the UC Davis campus. Our presenters and moderators answered this call for collaboration as evidenced by the wide range of participating disciplines: Native American Studies, Anthropology, Comparative Literature, Community Development, Cultural Studies, English, History, and Spanish & Portuguese. Sarah Laudenslayer at the Women’s Recruitment and Retention Center dedicated not only her design vision but also her time and patience to develop promotional materials for the symposium. Lastly, thank you to Alicia María Siu whose artwork Iyat Pahtli (Tobacco Medicine) embodies the hemispheric approach that we wish to bring to the symposium and our research, reminding us that creative approaches to Indigenous knowledge are invaluable and honored.

Did we mention that there will be snacks? :) We will have free flowing coffee, tea, water, and munchies in addition to our keynote luncheon and dessert reception. We hope that you join us for this exciting day of exchange as we engage the Indigenous Americas!

A special thanks to all of our sponsors:

Department of Native American Studies
College of Letters and Sciences: Division of Arts & Cultural Studies
Graduate Student Association
Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Resource Center
Native American Studies Graduate Student Association
Office of Graduate Studies
Student Recruitment and Retention Center
UC Davis Native American Faculty Association
Women’s Resources and Research Center

Thank you once again from the Native American Graduate Student Symposium Committee Co-Chairs
- Patricia Killelea and Christine M. Willie

Patricia Killelea will be reading poems from her book OTHER SUNS (Swan Scythe Press, 2011) on Thursday, January 26th from 7:30 PM - 9 PM at Logos Books in downtown Davis (513 Second St.). 

Logos Books is a non-profit independent bookstore, donating all proceeds to Doctors Without Borders and Save the Children.

Patricia will also be on the radio show "Dr. Andy's Poetry and Technology Hour," which will be aired on KDVS 90.5 FM on Wednesday, January 25th from 5 PM-6PM and will be available for streaming at kdvs.org/listen.

For more information, please visit Patricia's website: www.patriciakillelea.com 

Between the Lines: A trove from UC Davis faculty
Read more: http://www.sacbee.com/2011/06/27/3728947/a-trove-from-uc-davis-faculty.html#ixzz1QVFXkGdk

• "Other Suns" by Patricia Killelea (Swan Scythe, $12.95, 38 pages): The doctoral student's poetry deals with nature, conservation and "human engagement," particularly "the ways in which land shapes perception."
Read more: http://www.sacbee.com/2011/06/27/3728947/a-trove-from-uc-davis-faculty.html#ixzz1QVFRHxeo

Purchase Other Suns today!

From the back of the book:
Oscillating between alienation and wholeness, Other Suns carves a path between light and darkness, grief and continuance. From the edges of violence and doubt to “ridiculous hope,” these poems are firmly grounded in both the material world and spiritual risk. Killelea’s clear lyrics speak to the ways in which land shapes perception, reminding us that natural space is, indeed, social space.


“A marsh of all places— Patricia Killelea abides in this wild realm, writes of its character with respectful human engagement, and searches—by listening—the flow, temper, song, and silence of its birds and water. It in the saturated earth of Northern California’s Montezuma Slough, where the poet lives deeply, Killelea is the sharpest spiritual eye. Her voice is important to all who would learn, from the very silt of Creation, how to navigate personal and ecological disasters with a bold and pure adherence to vision.”

-- Sandra McPherson

“In Other Suns, the poet takes us, in her words, to “this in-between place… we peel back to,” the heart’s place of “merging voices” and “life saying itself to life again.” As a reader, I have received gratefully the fog in my throat and my mouth, indeed, tastes this river.”

-- Inés Hernández-Avila

On May 19-21, the UC Davis Department of Native American Studies hosted the official meeting of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association (NAISA). The program featured three days of presentations and activities. Several UCD NAS Grad Students presented including:

Brook Colley & Gina Caison: Uneasy Remains: Backyard Documentary, Human Remains, and the University of
California, Davis

Angel Hinzo: One People, Two Nations: The Ho-Chunk/Winnebago and the Implications of the
2000 Enrollment Addendum

Patricia Killelea: Between These Songs: Sherwin Bitsui’s Decolonizing Poetics in “Floodsong”

Cutcha Risling Baldy: NAGPRA 20 Years Later: What Works

Abel Ruiz: Indigenous GIS Mapping: Past and present challenges

James D. Sarmento: Reclamation and Revitalization: identity and language ideology in Native American
Studies

Silvia Soto: Zapatismo and the Buried Knowledges of an Indigenous Consciousness

Christine Willie: Meet at the Top: Diné Knowledge and Scientific Knowledge Contemplate Dibé