3rd Annual Native American Studies Graduate Student Symposium
Dreaming to Knowledge: Acorn Eaters in Transnational Waters
April 17-18, 2014
UC Davis
(MU-II in Memorial Union)

Picture
Nearly two weeks ago, the Native American Studies Graduate Student Symposium Committee hosted our 3rd Annual Native American Studies Graduate Student Symposium – Dreaming to Knowledge: Acorn Eaters in Transnational Waters. This year’s event was held on the UC Davis campus and provided an open forum for scholars from varying disciplines to present their research about Indigenous issues. As always, this symposium fostered a great atmosphere for critical dialogue and developing relationships across UC campuses.

This year’s NASGS Symposium once again extended its reach well beyond the previous two events and opened the call for papers to graduate students from the entire University of California system. We were delighted that the call for papers was answered with such enthusiasm from scholars across the state. Along with scholars from UC Davis, graduate students from six other UC schools attended the symposium as well. The participation from UC graduate students outside of our own campus is what made this event so dynamic and stimulating. This year’s event also featured an undergraduate panel comprised of three ambitious NAS majors from UC Davis. The 3rd Annual NAS Graduate Student Symposium was a two-day event from April 17th-18th, 2014 in the MUII room of the Memorial Union. The symposium began with opening remarks and traditional Shoshone songs by Dr. Steve Crum, our NAS department Chair. The symposium included ten sessions, 36 presenters, a creative hour, and two Keynote speakers including UC Davis Alumni and Attorney at law, Victorio Shaw and Professor of Gender Studies at UCLA, Dr. Mishuana Goeman.

At Dreaming to Knowledge: Acorn Eaters in Transnational Waters, we also displayed artwork submitted by graduate students and faculty in order to emphasize the creative aspects of Indigenous epistemologies. Sharing artwork allowed the participants of our symposium to celebrate Indigenous knowledge in a wide variety of ways. The items on display included a cradle board made by Beth Rose Middleton, a Northwest California Indian baby basket woven by Kateri Masten, Vanessa Esquivido’s basket cap and beads, photos from the last two symposiums taken by Bayu Kristianto, a Navajo rug by Christine Willie, a poster about the criminalization of tradition by Cutcha Risling Baldy and Stephanie Lumsden, original beadwork by Angel Hinzo, Indigenous Chinese basketry by Duskin Drum, and a painting of codices by Vreni Michelini Castillo.

The audience engaged with the presenters by asking thoughtful questions and making critical comments and the presenters were well prepared and eager to share their work.  At the end of two very full days of academic presentations, all who participated and attended the symposium were enriched by the plethora of important work they had heard.

The NASGS Symposium Planning Committee is immensely proud of what we accomplished this year. Our symposium continues to be the only event which caters specifically to the research being done on Indigenous issues by graduate students. This Symposium is relatively young, but the graduate committee at UC Davis intends on growing it even further. Three years ago, we had our first symposium which was open only to UC Davis graduate students. Last year, we extended our symposium to a two-day event and invited UC Berkeley graduate students. This year, we opened the call for papers to the entire UC system and hosted an undergraduate panel. Next year, the invitation to participate in the Native American Graduate Student Symposium will be extended to graduate students in universities everywhere!

See you next year!
Vanessa Esquivido
Bayu Kristianto
Rebecca Figueroa
Cuauhtemoc Lule
Sandra Gutierrez
Stephanie Lumsden
Angel Hinzo
Cutcha Risling Baldy

Schedule

Thursday April 17, 2014

8:00-8:50
Welcome & Opening Remarks
  • Keynote Speaker: Professor Steve Crum (Native American Studies, UC Davis)

9:00-10:20
Session 1 - To Tell the Story: Texts, Literature, the Arts and Decolonization
  • Activism and Decolonization through Literature: The Case of Native American Literature -- Bayu Kristianto (UC Davis)
  • The Disappointing Object: a Challenge to Dominant Epistemologies through the art of Jimmie Durham -- Catherine Czacki (UC San Diego)
  • In Yāōhuēhuētl, In Cuāuhtli: The Pre-Hispanic Past in Mexico's War for Independence and First Empire, 1810-1823 -- Cuauhtemoc Quintero Lule (UC Davis)
  • Native Women Leaders in California -- Vanessa Esquivido (UC Davis)

10:30-11:50am
Session 2 - Spirit Lines, Strength Lines and Knowledge: Indigenous Philosophy and Religion
  • Diverse communities, Decolonizing spaces: Native American spiritual networks in urban California -- Brian Clearwater (UC Santa Barbara)
  • Interdependence as a Lifeway: Religious Persistence and Indigenous Futurities in Native America -- Natalie Avalos Cisneros (UC Santa Barbara)
  • Indigenous Ontoepistemologies. On Vine Deloria Jr.’s The Metaphysics of Modern Existence --Juan Camilo Cajigas-Rotundo (UC Davis)
  • Indigenizing Marx’s Inorganic Body: Notes Toward a Materialist Theory of Human-Other-Than-Human Social Relations -- Ryan Rhadigan (UC Berkeley

12:00-1:20pm
Keynote Luncheon: Victorio Shaw (Hoopa Valley Tribe), Attorney at Law
Picture
Victorio graduated UC Davis - King Hall law school in May of 2011, and passed the California Bar Exam the same summer.  Victorio was admitted to the Bar in December of 2011 and immediately began practicing law as a salaried attorney in Sacramento.  He now practices law in Sonoma County, CA.  Since founding the Law Office of Victorio L Shaw, Victorio has been dedicated to serving Native American families, individuals, tribes, and organizations; as well as artists, musicians, and entrepreneurs. While at King Hall, Victorio concentrated on Federal Indian law, Entertainment law, Civil Rights, and Family law.  Victorio also served as  President of the Native American Law Students Association (NALSA),  member of the National Lawyers Guild (NLG), The Sports and Entertainment Law Club, and as an active participant in the Know Your Rights Club.
1:30-2:30 pm
Session 3
  • Does Public Law 280 Contribute to Domestic Violence on Southern California Indian Reservations? -- Alexandra Mojado (UCLA)
  • The Settler Colonial Schooling Dialectic: Native American and African American Education in Counterpoint -- Bayley J. Marquez (UC Berkeley)
  • Traditional Jurisprudence, Restorative Justice, and Tribal Courts: Reimagining Justice for Tribal Sovereignty -- Stephanie Lumsden (UC Davis)

2:40-3:40pm
Session 4
  • “White people would say this was impossible”: Decolonizing Western Narratives through Oral Histories and Cosmologies -- Angel Hinzo (UC Davis)
  • At the Cascade Falls: Decolonizing the Tribal Casino Discourse -- Brook Colley (UC Davis)
  • Imagining the Archive-- Yvonne Sherwood (UC Santa Cruz)

3:50-5:10pm
Roundtable Discussion
  • Reading towards Knowledge -- Corinne Bancroft, Nicole Dib, Margaret McMurtrey, Colton Saylor, Rebecca Tivang (UC Santa Barbara)

6:00 - 8:00 pm
This Event will be held in Art Annex 107 (Main Room)
Banquet & Creative Hour 
Join us for an evening of good food and creative arts presentations! 

Friday April 18, 2014

8:30 - 9:00 a.m.
Breakfast

9:00 - 9:20 a.m.
Welcome and Opening Remarks

9:30 - 10:30am
Session 5
  • Conflict Zones in the Mexican Forestry Sector and the Reconfiguration of P’urhépecha Autonomy in the State of Michoacán, Mexico, A Reflection on Juramukua -- Sandra Gutierrez (UC Davis)
  • Mapuche and Neoliberal Relationships to Land in Chile--Cinthya Ammerman (UC Davis)
  • Wixárika Activism Across the Margins -- Diana Negrín (UC Berkeley)

10:40-12:00 p.m.
Session 6 - A Dream for the Future: Undergraduate Research and Perspectives
  • Nationalism Through the Ballet Folklorico de México: Marginalization and Appropriation of Indigenous Dances in México -- Fabián Iglesias (UC Davis)
  • The Powwow at UC Davis -- Pamela Pretell (UC Davis)
  • War Party’s The Resistance: Native North American Hip Hop as a Musical Methods of Decolonization -- Justen H. Deaton (UC Davis)

12:15-1:30pm
Keynote Luncheon: Routed Stories and Native geographies: Land, Water and Body -- Dr. Mishuana Goeman (Tonawanda Band of Seneca), Associate Professor and Vice Chair of Gender Studies Department, UCLA
Picture
Dr. Mishuana Goeman, Tonawanda Band of Seneca, is an Associate Professor and Vice Chair of Gender Studies Department at the University of California, Los Angeles. She received her doctorate from Stanford University's Modern Thought and Literature and was a UC Presidential Post-doctoral fellow at Berkeley. Her book, Mark My Words: Native Women Mapping Our Nations( University of Minnesota Press, 2013) was honored at the American Association for Geographic Perspectives on Women. Currently she is also part of a grant on Mapping Indigenous L.A. that is working toward creating a community oriented mobile application that decolonizes the LA landscape. Mishuana Goeman provides feminist interventions into an analysis of colonial spatial restructuring of Native lands and bodies in the twentieth century. Through an examination of the ways that Native women’s art, film, poetry and prose reveal settler colonialism in North America as an enduring form of gendered spatial violence, she continually ask how rigid spatial categories, such as nations, borders, reservations, and urban areas are formed by settler nation-states structuring of space. 
1:40-2:40 pm
Session 7
  • “Aka aka foi, koi kiki kagi” or “laugh now and sooner or later you’ll cry”: The laughing and community organizing special. -- Juliann Anesi (Syracuse University)
  • tim-na’me (At the Lucky Spot She Bathes): The Hupa Women’s Flower Dance & Re-writing/ Re-righting how we talk about Indigenous menstrual beliefs and women’s coming of age -- Cutcha Risling Baldy (UC Davis)
  • Engaging Domesticity: Native Women Navigating Assimilation in the Bay Area, 1926 – 1946 -Caitlin “Katie” Keliiaa (UC Berkeley)

2:50-3:50pm
Session 8
  • Conflicts of Interest: Indigenous Language Teacher Training Policy in California and the United States -- Emily Moline (UC Davis)
  • Concern in Lakota Language Revitalization: A Glimpse at Who’s Learning Lakota Today and Why -- Tasha Hauff (UC Berkeley)
  • Self-Determined: Radio and Revitalization-- Kenny Dulock (UC Davis)

4:00-4:30pm
  • Bad Blood? The Visibility and Invisibility of Violence in the Antagonism Between Native Americans and African Americans--  Tria Andrews (UC Berkeley) and Olivia Chilcote (UC Berkeley)

4:40 - 6:00 pm
Session 10
  • these videos may not be for me -- duskin drum (UC Davis)
  • Un cuento sobre el Maiz, from Sacred to Transgenic -- Vreni Michelini Castillo (UC Berkeley)
  • “To The Library:” Andrés Henestrosa and The Traveling Text-- Paulina M. Gonzales, Ph.D. Candidate (UC San Diego)
  • Shift -- Wayne Marci (UC Santa Cruz)

Artist's Statement

Maggie Tabuce Howard
File Size: 24 kb
File Type: docx
Download File

Sponsors

Provost Ralph Hexter

Planning Committee

Vanessa Esquivido
Rebecca Figueroa
Sandra Gutierrez
Angel Hinzo
Bayu Kristianto
Cuauhtemoc Lule
Stephanie Lumsden
Cutcha Risling Baldy

2013 Symposium
2012 Symposium

2014submissionform
File Size: 14 kb
File Type: docx
Download File
2014CallForPapers
File Size: 13 kb
File Type: docx
Download File