Candessa Tehee and Indigenous Allotment Stories

04/25/22 • 37 min

Dr. Candessa Tehee is a Cherokee Nation citizen from the Locust, Tehee, Pumpkin, and McLemore families who earned her Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of Oklahoma. She is also an accomplished artist who was recognized as a Cherokee National Treasure for fingerweaving in 2019.
She previously served as the Executive Director of the Cherokee Heritage Center and the Manager of the Cherokee Language Program, and she worked in the Office of Curriculum and Instruction at the Cherokee Nation Immersion Charter School.
She joined the faculty of Northeastern State University (NSU) in Fall 2016 as a professor in the Department of Cherokee and Indigenous Studies. She has served as the Coordinator for the Cherokee Cultural Studies and Cherokee Education degree programs, and she is the Chair of the Department of Cherokee and Indigenous Studies at NSU. In 2021, she was elected as the District 2 Tribal Councilor of the Cherokee Nation Tribal Council.

See Candessa Tehee, "ᎪᎩ ᎤᏗᏞᎩ ᏗᏛᎪᏗ ᎾᏂᏪᏍᎬ ᎶᎶ: You can hear locusts in the heat of the summer," in Allotment Stories: Indigenous Land Relations under Settler Siege (2021) edited by Daniel Heath Justice and Jean M. O'Brien. Find the book at the following link: https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/allotment-stories

Previous Episode

Samuel Villarreal Catanach on the Role of Language Revitalization within the Process of Decolonization

Samuel Villarreal Catanach is from and grew up in P'osuwaegeh Owingeh (the Pueblo of Pojoaque). He serves as the director of the Pueblo of Pojoaque's Tewa Language Department. Samuel's goal is to give back to his community while continually defining and strengthening his identity and role as a Pueblo person.
In this episode he shares his passion and personal experiences with language revitalization within the process of decolonization, why it matters for all Indigenous peoples to learn and use our languages and histories, the challenges within the field of language revitalization, and some uplifting observations that he has had during his time in this line of work.
Resources:

First Peoples’ Cultural Council – fpcc.ca

Where Are Your Keys – whereareyourkeys.org

The Language Warrior's Manifesto: How to Keep Our Languages Alive No Matter the Odds by Anton Treuer

How to Keep Your Language Alive: A Commonsense Approach to One-on-One Language Learning by Leanne Hinton, Matt Vera, and Nancy Steele

The Routledge Handbook of Language Revitalization by Leanne Hinton (Editor), Leena Huss (Editor), and Gerald Roche (Editor)

Becoming Fluent: How Cognitive Science Can Help Adults Learn a Foreign Language by Richard Roberts and Roger Kreuz.

Next Episode

Alaska Native History and Food Sovereignty with Bridget Groat

At the time of this conversation, Dr. Bridget Groat was an assistant professor in the Native American and Indigenous Studies and history departments at Fort Lewis College. She is originally from Naknek, Alaska, which is a village located in the Bristol Bay region. She is Inupiaq, Alutiiq, Yup'ik, and Dena'ina. Her research focuses on salmon, Alaska Natives, food sovereignty, land and water, environmental history, Indigenous women, and Indigenous people.
She earned her doctoral degree in History at Arizona State University. Her dissertation is titled, "The Changing Tides of Bristol Bay: Salmon, Sovereignty, and Bristol Bay Natives" (2019). In 2022, she started a position as the Director of Native American and Indigenous Studies at the University of Wyoming.
Resources and ways to support:
United Tribes of Bristol Bay - www.utbb.com
Patagonia - www.patagonia.com
Trout Unlimited - www.tu.org