On this week's 51%, we continue our conversations with the Carey Institute's Logan Nonfiction fellows. Documentarian Tsanavi Spoonhunter previews her upcoming film, Holder of the Sky, on efforts to preserve treaty rights for native tribes in Wisconsin. And reporters Jillian Farmer and Cheryl Upshaw discuss their in-progress podcast, 50-Foot Woman, documenting life with the rare pituitary disease acromegaly.

Guests: Tsanavi Spoonhunter, producer/director of Holder of the Sky; Jillian Farmer and Cheryl Upshaw, producers of 50-Foot Woman

51% is a national production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio. Our producer is Jesse King, our executive producer is Dr. Alan Chartock, and our theme is “Lolita” by the Albany-based artist Girl Blue.

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You’re listening to 51%, a WAMC production dedicated to women’s issues and experiences. Thanks for joining us, I’m Jesse King. This week we’re continuing our conversations with some of this fall’s Logan Nonfiction fellows at the Carey Institute for Global Good. The program is currently remote for the coronavirus pandemic, so unfortunately fellows aren’t getting their usual retreat at the Carey Institute’s campus in Rensselaerville, New York - but its writers, filmmakers, podcasters, and photographers are still developing their projects and swapping advice through various online seminars and workshops. 

Tsanavi Spoonhunter spoke with me from Montana while filming her upcoming documentary Holder of the Sky. Spoonhunter is an American Indian reporter and filmmaker, and citizen of the Northern Arapahoe Tribe. Much of her storytelling focuses on Indian Country, including her latest documentary short, Crow Country: Our Right to Food Sovereignty, which has been screening at various festivals and venues. As she heads into the Logan Nonfiction Program, however, her focus is on Holder of the Sky. 

Tell me about Holder of the Sky. What is your focus with the film?

So Holder of the Sky chronicles several tribes in the state of Wisconsin and their struggle to retain their treaty rights that were made with the government back in the 1800s - and how those treaty rights are still being challenged today, and what that looks like in present day. I focus on the Lac du Flambeau up in northern Wisconsin, the Oneida Nation, which is just outside of Green Bay, and then the Menominee tribe.

For those who don't know, what are some examples of the treaty rights that you were examining in the film? Like what do treaty rights usually entail?

Yeah, so a treaty right is a binding agreement between two sovereign nations. When the U.S. government started relocating tribes to reservations, that affected tribal life, their daily life. Tribes weren't able to go and access their traditional homelands for food or any of the things that they did. And so with those agreements, tribes were able to negotiate, "If I go on to a reservation, I'll be able to go off the reservation to hunt and fish anywhere that I want." That is an example of one of the tribes in Wisconsin that we're following: they were able to go out and practice their traditional spear-hunting rights. And then, you know, there was an uprising known as the Walleye Wars, and this is just one example in the film. Tribal members went off the reservation, and were hunting using a spearfishing tradition, and local, non-tribal folks got really upset, because they felt that tribes were given a privilege - that they were given more privileges than any other U.S. citizen, without really understanding the treaty rights and what tribes sacrificed in order to obtain that right to spearfish. I think that's a good example to highlight, you know about treaty rights in the United States. And it plays to the present day: we're following one character who was recently shot at last spring while he was spearfishing.

Most of the tribes you're looking at are in Wisconsin. What brings you to Montana?

So ther