Center for Native American and Indigenous Studies Newsletter - CNAIS Newsletter Fall 2022
Hello Everyone,
Welcome to the start of the new academic year. We are extremely excited about this new year for a number of reasons. First of all, CU-Boulder has produced an official Land Acknowledgement statement, which included a great deal of consultation with CNAIS. In addition, as many of you know, CNAIS and CU-Boulder helped lead the way towards the passage of a bill in the Colorado state legislature which provides in-state tuition to enrolled Native American students from any of 48 tribes historically associated with Colorado. New students entering this Fall are the first new class coming in under the new tuition rules. I have already had the chance to talk to new Native students who told me specifically that they were here because of those tuition changes. Our incoming freshman class has almost double the Native enrollment of recent past classes, so the tuition bill is already having an effect. In recognition of this, CNAIS teamed with the Office of Diversity, Equity and Community Engagement to provide for the first time a welcome and orientation specifically for new Native freshmen, on Aug. 20. CU Boulder is also moving towards the creation of a new Tribal Liaison executive position for the campus. We are also pleased to announce that contributions to our scholarship funds are up noticeably over the last two years, which has allowed us to provide scholarship help to a number of different undergraduate and graduate students. Thanks so much to our donors!
CNAIS is also sponsoring or involved in many different teaching and research events this year, including the U.N. Right Here, Right Now Global Climate Summit in December. This event will feature a number of very high-profile indigenous leaders and spokespeople from around the world. Details on other events can be found elsewhere in this newsletter, focused on climate, justice, indigenous knowledge, language and culture. We have a number of new goals and ideas which we hope to develop during this coming year, including a Tribal Climate Leaders Program to help Native and Indigenous communities better address climate challenges.
Andy Cowell, CNAIS Director
CNAIS Events
Native Welcome is an open house at the Center for Native American and Indigenous Studies (CNAIS). We welcome incoming Native American students, transfer students and current students to meet with our CU Boulder staff, American Indian Alumni, NAIS faculty and Boulder community. Join us at the CNAIS cottage (1330 Grandview Ave.) for pizza, games and give-aways.
This inter-faith panel discussion focuses on sacred responses to environmental crisis. Panelists will discuss how religious ethics are shaping environmental ethics from a Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, and Indigenous perspective. Panelists include: Loriliai Biernacki, Tink Tinker, Sam Boyd, David Takahashi, Christinia Eala,Nana Firman, and Lindsay Garcia.
The 54th Algonquian Conference: Launching the International Decade of Indigenous Languages 2022-2032
The 54th Algonquian Conference will be held in Boulder, CO on Oct. 20-23, 2022. The conference will have Aleksei Tsykarev, United Nation Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues giving our opening address. Followed by two plenary speakers, John Paul Murdoch (Cree Nation) and Ben Barnes (Shawnee) who will specifically address issues from broader legal, political and other perspectives that will complement work in language documentation, study, maintenance and revitalization and special panels on this topic. Both US and Canadian political and legal landscapes will be addressed, as well as potential international cooperation.
Brownbag at CNAIS, Friday, September 30th, 12:00-1:00pm
Innocent People! Innocent People! Innocent People!: Evictions of Maasai Indigenous people from Loliondo and Ngorongoro Conservation Area in Tanzania, EAST AFRICA.
Dr. Laura DeLuca Director of Global Seminar Tanzania and Teaching Assistant Professor, Stories and Societies and Forrest Becker an undergraduate Geography major and alumni of the Global Seminar Tanzania study abroad program Summer 2022. DeLuca and Becker will report on first-hand interactions with indigenous activists from their time in Tanzania and Kenya in June and July 2022.