Episode #1: First Nations, Metis, and the Canadian Government
Join your host J Kēhaulani Kauanui for an episode that features two interview segments and music. The first part of the show includes an interview with Erica Lee (Cree) and Alex Wilson (Opaskwayak Cree Nation) about Idle No More, an ongoing Native-led protest movement taking on the Canadian government, which has spread across the globe among other indigenous peoples in solidarity. Erica Lee is a political philosophy student at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada, and a member of the Indigenous Students Council who has been working as an Idle No More organizer since speaking at the first official rally in November 2012. Alex Wilson is Associate Professor and Director of Aboriginal Education Research Centre. In the second segment, we hear from Chis Andersen (Métis ) about the ruling in Daniels v. Canada, a legal case having to do with the Canadian constitutional status of Métis and “non-status Indians.” Chris Andersen is an Associate Professor and Associate Dean Research in the Faculty of Native Studies, University of Alberta. He is currently the Director of the Rupertsland Centre for Métis Research. Original air-date: 2-8-13.
Episode #2: The Violence Against Women Act & The Two Row Wampum Renewal Campaign
Join your host J Kēhaulani Kauanui for an episode that features two segments. Part I of the show features an interview Sarah Deer (Muscogee Nation of Oklahoma) who will tell us about the Native American aspects of the Violence Against Women Act – legislation recently passed by the US Senate and currently before the House. Provisions allowing tribal courts authorities over non-Indians are at the center of Republican opposition. Deer is an Associate Professor at William Mitchell College of Law, and is chair of a U.S. Department of Justice federal advisory committee designed to develop protocol for responding to sexual assault in tribal communities. In part II, I will be speaking with Andy Mager and Wendy Gonyea (Onandaga) from the Two Row Wampum Renewal Campaign, a partnership between the Onondaga Nation and Neighbors of the Onondaga Nation (NOON), a major statewide educational campaign in New York to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the first treaty between the Haudenosaunee and European settlers. Andy Mager is the project coordinator for the Two Row Wampum Renewal Campaign. Wendy Gonyea is a Clanmother for the Beaver Clan of the Onondaga Nation. Original air-date: 2-22-13.
Episode #3: Mishuana Goeman on “Superdiversity” and Decolonization & Desireé Reneé Martinez on the Tongva Burial Case at Campo Santo, Los Angeles
Join your host J Kēhaulani Kauanui for an episode that features two segments. Part I of the show includes a talk recently delivered by Mishuana Goeman (Tonawanda Band of Seneca), “Superdiversity, Settler Colonialism, and Paths Toward a Decolonized Future,” which was presented at the UCLA conference, “Superdiversity California Style: New Approaches to Race, Civil Rights, Governance and Cultural Production.” Goeman is an assistant professor of Gender Studies Department at the University of California, Los Angeles. Her book, Mark My Words: Native Women Mapping Our Nations, will be published this spring with University of Minnesota Press. In part II, the show features an interview Kauanui conducted with Desireé Reneé Martinez (Gabrieliño) at La Placita Olvera in Los Angeles for an update on the Tongva burial case involving the museum construction of “LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes at El Pueblo” Historic Monument, which is dedicated to showcasing and preserving the history of Mexicans and Mexican-Americans in Los Angeles. In January 2011, she, with other community members and archaeologists, was instrumental in bringing to light the secret removal of burials from the Campo Santo, the historic Catholic cemetery in Downtown Los Angeles which holds the remains of early Los Angelenos, including the ancestors of the Gabrieliño, Luiseno, Cahuilla, Juaneno, and Paiute peoples. Martinez is an archaeologist working for Cogstone Resource Management. She is completing her dissertation at Harvard University, which investigates the relationship between Native Americans and archaeologists in order to find ways to incorporate indigenous perspectives into the practice of archaeology. She is a co-Director of the Pimu Catalina Island Archaeological Field School. Original air-date: 3-8-13.
Episode #4: The Land Peace Foundation & The Palestinian Right of Return conference
Tune-in with your host J. Kēhaulani Kauanui for a new episode in two parts-first we hear from Sherri L. Mitchell (Penobscot), the Executive Director of the Land Peace Foundation, which is based in Maine and provides low cost legal assistance and alternative conflict resolution services to Indigenous nations, groups and organizations in order to protect their human rights, homelands, sacred sites, natural resources and cultural heritage. She discusses the onslaught of resource extraction across the Canadian Maritimes and Maine that threaten not just indigenous peoples, but also the ecosystems of these regions that have vast implications for all human life. Second, I interview Jamil Sbitan and Zena Ozeir about the Palestinian Right of Return conference that will take place at the Boston University Law School Auditorium on April 6-7, 2013. Sbitan is a member of its Students for Justice in Palestine chapter and is on the organizing committee for the Conference. Ozeir is in her last year of studies at Boston University, completing her Bachelor’s degree in International Relations and Arabic, and is the President of Boston University’s Students for Justice in Palestine. Original air-date: 3-22-13.
Episode #5: The R-word, The Washington Football Team and the Politics of Trademarks
Join your host, J. Kēhaulani Kauanui, for a focus on the legal battle to ban the racist “redskins” trademark. New legislation recently introduced to the US House would ban the trademarking of the term and other racist language against Native Americans. If passed, the proposed Non-Disparagement of Native American Persons or Peoples in Trademark Registration Act of 2013 would strip the Washington football team of its trademarked name, cancel the federal registrations of trademarks that use the term in reference to Native Americans, and prevent future registrations. Guests on the show include Suzan Shown Harjo (Cheyenne and Hodulgee Muscogee) – the lead plaintiff with six other American Indians who in 1992 filed the landmark case, Harjo et al v. Pro Football, Inc., against the disparaging name of the Washington football team – and Victoria Phillips, Professor at the American University Washington College of Law, who teaches communications and intellectual property law. Original air-date: 4-12-13.
Episode #6: S. James Anaya, UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
Join your host, J. Kēhaulani Kauanui, for an episode featuring a talk by S. James Anaya (Purepecha and Chiricahua Apache), UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, titled “Reflections on the Fifth Anniversary of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The lecture was recently delivered at the Suffolk University Law School. Anaya is a Regents Professor and the James J. Lenoir Professor of Human Rights Law and Policy at the University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law, where he teaches and writes in the areas of international human rights, constitutional law, and issues concerning indigenous peoples. Original air-date: 4-26-13.
Episode #7: Settler colonialism in Hawai’i
Join your host, J. Kēhaulani Kauanui, for a show with two segments focused on settler colonialism in Hawai i. In Part I, listeners will hear an interview with Judy Rohrer and Dean Saranillio on the legacy and politics of white and Asian settler colonialism. Rohrer is an Assistant Professor in Residence in the Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies program at the University of Connecticut, Storrs. Her first book is Haoles in Hawai’i (University of Hawaii Press, 2010) and she is working on her second manuscript, Staking Claim: Race and Indigeneity in Hawai i. Dean Saranillio is an assistant professor of Asian/Pacific/American Studies in the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis at New York University. He is currently working on a book titled The Theatricality of the Settler State: Hawai’i Statehood and the Liberal Politics of Empire Building, which situates the admission of Hawai’i as a U.S. state at the crossroads of U.S. Empire. Part II of the program features a talk by Noelani Goodyear-Ka’ōpua (Kanaka Maoli) that she recently delivered at an event called Sovereign Pedagogies on settler colonialism in Hawai i and Palestine, which was held at New York University on May 2, 2013. The event was organized by Dean Itsuji Saranillio and hosted by Asian/Pacific/ American Studies. In the talk, Goodyear-Ka’ōpua discusses her new book, The Seeds We Planted: Portraits of a Native Hawaiian Charter School. She is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa and co-founder of Hālau Kū Māna public charter school. Original air-date: 5-10-13.
Episode #8: Features from the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues
Join your host J. Kēhaulani Kauanui for an episode featuring several interviews conducted at the United Nations headquarters in NYC for the 12th session of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (May 20-31, 2013). The UN Permanent Forum is an advisory body to the Economic and Social Council with a mandate to discuss indigenous issues related to economic and social development, culture, the environment, education, health and human rights. Tune-in to hear Kauanui’s interviews with Santi Hitorangi (Ma`ohi) from the island of Rapa Nui (also known as Easter Island) about indigenous resistance to Chilean state violence and genocidal land policies, as well as the problems with the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP); three Pacific Islander scholars who traveled from Hawai’i address climate change in Oceania as a human rights issue: Tēvita Ō. Ka’ili (from Tonga), Christina Akanoa (from Sāmoa) and Katoa Sailusi (from Tuvalu); Jonathan Kamakawiwo’ole Osorio (Kanaka Maoli) who discusses what it means to take a pro-indigenous stand on Hawaiian independence in an attempt to bridge the split between Hawaiians fighting for Kingdom restoration and those who instead would be happy to see a federally recognized Native Hawaiian Governing Entity under US domestic policy. The show also includes an audio recording of a compelling intervention delivered by Tristan Moone (Diné) on behalf of the Global Indigenous Youth Caucus followed by an interview with her. Original air-date: 5-24-13.
Episode #9: Tiokasin Ghosthorse and Debra White Plume at Left Forum
This week’s episode of “Indigenous Politics” Radio, with your host, J. Kēhaulani Kauanui, features two presentations from a panel on “Indigenizing Our Paradigms” recently held at Left Forum – the largest gathering in North America of the US and international Left – held in NYC June 7-9, 2013. The first presentation is by Tiokasin Ghosthorse (Cheyenne River Lakota Nation of South Dakota), the host of First Voices Indigenous Radio on WBAI NY – Pacifica Radio, followed by Debra White Plume (Oglala Nation), Director at Owe Aku, Bring Back the Way, who is a well-known activist fighting to protect sacred water from Keystone XL. Original air-date: 6-14-13.
Episode #10: Ahmad Amara on the Bedouin Arabs and John Kane on Native New York
This week’s episode of “Indigenous Politics” Radio, with your host, J. Kēhaulani Kauanui, comes to you in two segments. Part I features an interview with Ahmad Amara discussing a book he co-edited, Indigenous (In)Justice: Human Rights Law and Bedouin Arabs in the Naqab/Negev. Amara is a Palestinian Human rights lawyer, and a PhD candidate in the History Department and the Hebrew and Judaic Studies Department at New York University. Part II includes a segment of a talk recently delivered by John Kane (Mohawk), an indigenous radio producer, who spoke on a panel about indigenous radio at Left Forum. He is the producer and host of a show called “Let’s Talk Native…” on WWKB in Buffalo, NY. He has been a voice for Native sovereignty for several decades. Original air-date: 6-28-13.
Episode #11: Racial Apartheid in Indian Country & Genocidal Occupation in West Papua
Join your host, J. Kehaulani Kauanui for a two part program on “Indigenous Politics: From Native New England and Beyond.” The first segment features an interview with attorney Hannibal B. Johnson about his new book, Apartheid in Indian Country?: Seeing Red over Black Disenfranchisement. His work traces historical relations between African Americans and Native Americans, particularly in Oklahoma, “Indian Country” with an examination of some of the legal, political, economic, social, and moral issues surrounding the present controversy over the tribal citizenship of the Freedmen. The second part of the show focuses on the genocidal crisis in West Papua due to the Indonesian occupation and includes interviews with human rights activists Rosa Moiwend and Herman Wainggai. Moiwend is an organizer for the Pacific Nonviolence Network, a member of War Resisters’ International (WRI), and co-founder of the National Papua Solidarity (NAPAS), an Indonesia solidarity action network for West Papua, based in Jakarta. Wainggai is former political prisoner living in exile who represents the Federated Republic of West Papua in Washington, DC, and is a Visiting Scholar at George Mason University. Original air-date: 7-12-13.