This week, we’re getting a little wild — in the best, most relational way. Temryss and Matika sit down with scholar and environmental educator Hailey Maria Salazar, (Yoeme) for a playful, grounded, and deeply expanding conversation on eco-erotics: the sensual, intimate, curious ways we relate to land, water, plants, animals, wind, and all our more-than-human relatives.

Building from last week’s convo with Dr. Melissa Nelson, we explore how Indigenous stories, teachings, and everyday practices hold erotic knowledge — not in the Western shame-laden sense, but as connection, aliveness, risk, pleasure, and belonging. From berry-picking teachings, sensual winds, and yes… the infamous earthworm story… we open up what it means to feel deeply with the world around us.

This episode is fun, lighthearted, and full of laughter — but also a reminder that joy, intimacy, and pleasure are vital forms of resistance, especially in heavy political times. So take this moment with us to breathe, giggle, blush a little, and remember what it feels like to be connected.

Settle in, relatives. The world of eco-erotics awaits.

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Follow us on Instagram @amrpodcast, or support our work on Patreon. Show notes are published on our website, Allmyrelationspodcast.com. Matika's book Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America is available now! T'igwicid and Hyshqe for being on this journey with us.

Have you ever had a relationship with an inanimate object? Or been stirred by the scent of the forest or sound of birds? Are you practicing eco-eroticism and you don’t even know it?

In this episode, we are joined by Dr. Melissa K. Nelson, Turtle Mountain Chippewa ecologist, scholar, and author of Getting Dirty: The Eco-Eroticism of Women in Indigenous Oral Literatures. 

Together, we explore ecoerotics—a way of understanding and connecting with the world as kin, not as resource. With laughter and stories, this conversation brings forth Ancestral Intelligence (the true A.I.)–that reminds us of the power of our sensuality and intimacy with the world. There’s sacred activism brimming between skin and soil, driftwood and hand, breath and water.

What awakens when we let ourselves get dirty—when we surrender ourselves and feel deeply with the land? Melissa reminds us that Indigenous remembering and sacred stories of our relationships with plant and animal kin aren’t just myths—they’re real relationships. Living, breathing, co-mingling connections filled with the depth and meaning that we imagine as an antidote to settler colonialism.

Eco-eroticism is a doorway to our bodies and space. So get curious; it’s time to reenter kinship with all our relations.

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Follow us on Instagram @amrpodcast, or support our work on Patreon. Show notes are published on our website, Allmyrelationspodcast.com. Matika's book Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America is available now! T'igwicid and Hyshqe for being on this journey with us.

We’re closing out this season of All My Relations with something new and something we’re deeply proud of: the launch of our Author Talk series — the first step in the All My Relations + NDN Girls Book Club.

In this debut Author Talk, Matika and Temryss sit down with poet and memoirist Sasha LaPointe (Upper Skagit, Nooksack), whose work explores trauma, healing, punk rock, and the power of ancestral memory. Together, they dive into Sasha’s acclaimed books Red Paint and Thunder Song, weaving in stories of lineage, belonging, and the courage it takes to write the things we’re told not to say.

This tender conversation is an intimate exploration of Sasha’s life as an author, where we deep dive into storytelling as a form of Indigenous resistance and remembrance, and the challenges of writing through trauma with clarity and care. Sasha reflects on what it means to be a prolific Indigenous woman author and, reveals the hidden histories beneath the tulip fields of the Skagit Valley, and shares how the stories of her ancestors—and sea maidens—still live in her writing and spirit.

This episode is not only the season finale—this episode is big medicine, and it’s also an invitation. We hope you’ll read along with us, join our hybrid book discussions, and help us build a community that supports Indigenous authors. Sign up for the All My Relations Book Club at allmyrelationspodcast.com/book-club to get invites, books,  background materials, and access to our live events.

Resources:
 – Support Sasha’s books: Red Paint, Rose Quartz, and Thunder Song
– Join the Book Club: allmyrelationspodcast.com/book-club
– Support us on Patreon to watch the full video version of this Author Talk
– Learn more about NDN Girls Book Club and the good work they’re doing to support Native authors and youth

Love this episode? Text the link to a friend or tell your auntie.

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Support the show

Follow us on Instagram @amrpodcast, or support our work on Patreon. Show notes are published on our website, Allmyrelationspodcast.com. Matika's book Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America is available now! T'igwicid and Hyshqe for being on this journey with us.

What does it mean to say that rape is not a crime of passion, but a tool of conquest? In this searing episode, Matika sits down with Chief Justice Sarah Deer—legal scholar, citizen of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, and longtime advocate for Native women—to break down the root causes of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and People (MMIWP) crisis. Together, they trace the systemic failures—from jurisdictional loopholes and underfunded Tribal justice systems to harmful stereotypes and state indifference—that enable violence against Native people to persist across generations.

Sarah shares insights from decades of research, courtroom advocacy, and lived experience. She explains why the word “rape” still matters, how U.S. law continues to reflect colonial patriarchy, and what tribal sovereignty has to do with personal safety. With clarity and care, she connects the dots between land theft, gender-based violence, and narrative erasure—and offers a vision for Indigenous feminist legal theory that centers survivor agency and collective healing.

This is a vital episode for anyone who wants to understand the roots of violence and the pathways to justice in Indian Country.

Learn more about Sarah Deer’s work at sarahdeer.com.

Educational Reading & Reports

• Sarah Deer’s The Beginning and End of Rape is essential reading on how U.S. law enables violence against Native women—and how we can reclaim justice through sovereignty and Indigenous feminist legal theory. Purchase the book here.

• Broken Promises: Continuing Federal Funding Shortfall for Native Americans is a 2018 report by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights detailing chronic underfunding of Native programs. Read it here.

• Justice Denied: The Reality of the Tribal Law and Order Act by Amnesty International explores how systemic legal gaps harm Native women. View the report.

Advocacy & Action

•The National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center offers toolkits, trainings, and support for survivors and advocates working to end violence against Native women.

•The Sovereign Bodies Institute collects data and honors MMIW2S cases, centering Indigenous-led research and action.

•MMIW USA provides direct services and support for families of the missing and murdered, offering healing and justice-centered care.

•The Urban Indian Health Institute provides data, reports, and resources on urban Native health disparities, including MMIWP-specific studies.

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Support the show

Follow us on Instagram @amrpodcast, or support our work on Patreon. Show notes are published on our website, Allmyrelationspodcast.com. Matika's book Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America is available now! T'igwicid and Hyshqe for being on this journey with us.

We are so proud to introduce our newest collaboration: The Old Growth Table, a brand new podcast hosted by Valerie Segrest (Muckleshoot), launching from our home at Tidelands Studio in downtown Seattle. It’s something we’ve been manifesting for years and it’s finally here! 

In this very special episode, we invite you into the first season of The Old Growth Table by airing its premiere episode right here on All My Relations.

Valerie Segrest, Native nutritionist and food advocate, invites us in with teachings about springtime, a season of awakening, when the first wild foods emerge after months of winter stillness. She introduces us to two early spring greens—nettles and dandelions—and shows us how they offer more than nutrition. These are ancestral foods that carry teachings, stories, and ceremony.

With humor, honesty, and deep care, we talk about what it means to rekindle relationships with these foods, especially when those relationships have been disrupted or shrouded in shame. Valerie reminds us that food is not just about nutrients— they offer us wisdom, remembering, and healing.

Valerie also welcomes two powerful voices in Indigenous food sovereignty—Mariah Gladstone of Indigikitchen and Sean Sherman, author of The Sioux Chef—who join the conversation to reflect on what it means to say: Our food is our medicine.

So come join us. Let’s listen, gather, and nourish. 🌿

This is The Old Growth Table. And this is just the beginning.

Please support the work of our amazing guests:

• Mariah Gladstone – Founder of Indigikitchen on at www.indigikitchen.com/  and on Instagram at @indigikitchen
• Sean Sherman – Chef, author of The Sioux Chef’s Indigenous Kitchen, at https://seansherman.com/  and on Instagram at @siouxchef

Help us grow The Old Growth Table by subscribing, rating, and sharing:
🔗 oldgrowthtable.com
🎧 Listen and follow wherever you get your podcasts
📲 Follow us on Instagram: @oldgrowthtable
💌 Share with your community — and let us know how you’re (re)connecting to ancestral foods

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Support the show

Follow us on Instagram @amrpodcast, or support our work on Patreon. Show notes are published on our website, Allmyrelationspodcast.com. Matika's book Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America is available now! T'igwicid and Hyshqe for being on this journey with us.

In early January 2025, catastrophic wildfires swept through the ancestral homelands of the Tongva, Tataviam, Serrano, Kizh, and Chumash Peoples. National media coverage largely overlooked how our Indigenous relatives were responding, and coping amid the uncontrollable flames, and how they were recovering after.

To document these stories from an Indigenous perspective, we sent our teammate Francisco “Panchó” Sánchez, a Xicano filmmaker and journalist, to Tovangar.  In this episode, he sits down with community members, activists, and organizers so we can hear their experiences and understand this climate crisis from an Indigenous perspective. We are honored to be in conversation with:

– Jessa Calderon (Chumash and Tongva), poet, musician, author of Sisterhood, and Director of The Land, Water and Climate Justice for Sacred Places Institute for Indigenous Peoples

– Jolie Varela (Tule River Yokuts and Nüümü), founder of Indigenous Women Hike.

– Vinecea Edwards Esq (Mvskoke), Senior Director of Operations and Strategy at Urban American Indian Involvement (UAII).

– Amy Stretten (Chickahominy), Director of Marketing and Communications at UAII.

– Alexia Palomino Cortez, PhD candidate and Altadena fire survivor.

– Katherine Guerrero-Yañez, adopted Tongva tribal member and Altadena high school teacher.

If settler-colonialism’s land mismanagement is the root of our current climate catastrophe, then the path forward is rooted in Indigenous land stewardship, for we know fire as a relative, water as life, and earth as home. The stories shared in this episode remind us that the work ahead requires us all — not just to respond to crisis, but to return to relationship. To steward, to protect, to show up for each other like family. Because relatives keep us safe.

Learn more and support the work of our guests:
 – Sacred Places Institute for Indigenous Peoples: sacredplacesinstitute.org
– Indigenous Women Hike: indigenouswomenhike.com
– Urban American Indian Involvement (UAII): uaii.org

Credits
Reporting, field production and film work by Francisco “Pancho” Sánchez (@videosdelsancho)

Editing by Teo Shantz

Produced by Matika Wilbur

Co/hosted by Temryss Lane

Social Media by Katharina Mei-Fa Brinschwitz

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Support the show

Follow us on Instagram @amrpodcast, or support our work on Patreon. Show notes are published on our website, Allmyrelationspodcast.com. Matika's book Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America is available now! T'igwicid and Hyshqe for being on this journey with us.

In this episode of All My Relations, Matika Wilbur (Swinomish and Tulalip) and Temryss Lane (Lummi Nation) are joined by Gina Amato Lough, Directing Attorney of Public Counsel’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, to unpack the realities of ICE in Indian Country. We dive into the self-made crisis at the southern border of what is now known as the United States, and the dangers that face not just (im)migrant and Native communities, but everyone living here.

With the expertise of someone who has over 20 years of experience working in direct service with asylum seekers, immigrants in detention, survivors of violent crime, unaccompanied children, and victims of notario fraud, Gina guides this conversation with grace in contextualizing where we are right now. She reminds us that the inhumane actions taken by the Trump Administration like the implementation of Remain in Mexico Program and the removal of the CBP App, which eliminated the only lawful way for people to enter the border through – is rooted in U.S. imperialism and has devastating consequences for us all. 

We explore the unintended consequences and ongoing ramifications of our rapidly eroding democracy; how Trump’s deportation machine, if successful, ensures catastrophic consequences for our economy, our education systems, and the base of what supports all our communities. We are reminded that this is not a single issue. ICE in Indian Country impacts all of our livelihoods at every level. 

So, what does it mean to be a good relative right now? 

We must return to solidarity with one another. Gina reminds us that focusing on our shared history, cultures, goals and values binds us, and it is by design that communities of color are pitted against each other. The Trump administration’s “shock and awe” tactics are not just policy decisions—they are deliberate strategies meant to exhaust us, burn us out, and keep us on the defensive. 

So start by staying informed, knowing your rights, and sharing resources in the community. From a monetary standpoint, there are organizations you can support like Public Counsel or ACLU – links to all resources mentioned are listed below. 

This is a call to all relatives—Indigenous and non-Native alike. Keeping our communities safe requires knowing the tactics being used against us and resisting together. We must move beyond defense and take the offensive—leveraging our power through advocacy, spending, voting, and boycotts. Our creativity is more crucial than ever. Together, we are powerful.

• Public Counsel Donation: https://publiccounsel.org/donate/
• ACLU: https://www.aclu.org/ 
• Northwest Immigrant Rights Project: https://nwirp.org/

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Support the show

Follow us on Instagram @amrpodcast, or support our work on Patreon. Show notes are published on our website, Allmyrelationspodcast.com. Matika's book Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America is available now! T'igwicid and Hyshqe for being on this journey with us.

Happy Love Day, Relatives! While Valentine’s Day may be wrapped in candy hearts and Hallmark sentiments, its origins are far from sweet. As NPR’s Arnie Seipel reminds us, its history is "dark, bloody, and a bit muddled." In ancient Rome, Lupercalia—a violent fertility festival—was held from February 13th to 15th, perhaps explaining why red became the color of love.

But today, we shift the focus away from romantic love and toward something deeper: self-love, communal love, and intergenerational healing.

In this episode, we are joined by the incredible Vina Brown, the creative force behind Copper Canoe Woman. Vina, from the Heiltsuk and Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations, is not only an acclaimed jewelry artist but also a scholar, currently pursuing her PhD at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, where she studies Indigenous food sovereignty and wellness. She is also the co-founder of Rooted Resiliency, a nonprofit dedicated to reclaiming Indigenous wellness practices.

Together, we dive into the messy, powerful, and transformative aspects of love. "Real love is messy," Vina reminds us. "It’s not pretty, it’s not perfect, but that’s what makes it so beautiful." We explore self-care beyond consumerism, moving away from the capitalist version of “self-care”—think retail therapy and spa days—toward a decolonized perspective. Audre Lorde’s words guide us: "Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare."

Vina shares the story of her grandmother Elsie, a residential school survivor who embarked on her healing journey later in life, breaking generational cycles by learning to love openly. We discuss the power of community healing, the necessity of platonic love, and the strength in vulnerability. "We don’t heal in silos," Vina says. "We heal in community."

As part of this journey, we’re also hosting Reclaiming Wellness, a community event featuring Indigenous women leaders focusing on movement, meditation, and reconnecting with ancestral knowledge.

Join us as we recommit to self-love, embrace relationality over individualism, and recognize that healing is a lifelong journey. As Vina reminds us, "Our ancestors knew we were interconnected. The land, the wind, the water—they all hold us."

Let’s reclaim love—love for ourselves, our communities, and our lands. Share this conversation, connect with us, and be part of this movement. ❤️

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Follow us on Instagram @amrpodcast, or support our work on Patreon. Show notes are published on our website, Allmyrelationspodcast.com. Matika's book Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America is available now! T'igwicid and Hyshqe for being on this journey with us.

Today is the Super Bowl, and while millions gather to watch, we’re here to ask: What are we really watching? In this episode of All My Relations, Temryss Lane (Lummi Nation) and Matika Wilbur (Swinomish & Tulalip) dive into the deep, complex relationship between Native communities and sport.

American football is more than just a game—it’s a battlefield. From its origins at the Carlisle Indian School to its modern-day spectacle of billion-dollar profits, colonial metaphors, and racialized labor, the sport reflects a larger American story. “Football is about violence. It’s about territory. It’s about power,” Temryss reminds us.

We discuss how sports have been both a tool of oppression and liberation for Native athletes, the NFL’s plantation-like structure, the devastating impact of CTE on Black and Indigenous players, and the erasure of Native identity through mascotry (looking at you, Chiefs fans).

“I can’t unsee it. Football is a game where predominantly Black players put their brains on the line for white owners to get richer,” says Matika. “And yet, I grew up watching it with my grandma, pretending to care at Super Bowl parties, and even playing fantasy leagues for years.”

We hold the contradictions of loving sport, recognizing its harm, and pushing for better. “Sports teach us belonging,” Temryss says. “It’s why Native people are damn good at them.”

Watch the Super Bowl if you must, but listen to this first. And for the record—Go Eagles. 🦅

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Support the show

Follow us on Instagram @amrpodcast, or support our work on Patreon. Show notes are published on our website, Allmyrelationspodcast.com. Matika's book Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America is available now! T'igwicid and Hyshqe for being on this journey with us.

In this episode of All My Relations, Matika Wilbur (Swinomish and Tulalip) and Temryss Lane (Lummi Nation)—sit down with Indigenous rights attorney Gabe Galanda (Round Valley Indian Tribes) to discuss the mounting legal threats to Tribal Nationhood, citizenship, and sovereignty. As executive orders and court cases attempt to undermine Native status and question our birthright citizenship, we unpack what’s happening and what’s at stake.

Together, we explore the legal history behind Native Citizenship, from Elk v. Wilkins to the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924, and how the Supreme Court continues to challenge the political status of Tribal Nations. Gabe highlights the ongoing erasure of Indigenous identity under U.S. law, warning that Native people remain "sub-citizens," not universally protected by the U.S. Constitution, and that our status exists at the mercy of an act of Congress. He raises the unsettling reality that if a simple majority of Congress were to revoke the 1924 Citizenship Act, we could once again be placed in legal limbo.

We also turn inward, examining how Tribal policies around blood quantum and disenrollment are eroding our sovereignty from within. Gabe points out that over 70% of Tribal Nations still use blood quantum—a colonial, racialized construct—to determine belonging. We ask ourselves how we can continue to argue for our political status while using a racial measurement to determine our own citizenship? If we don’t address these internal challenges, are we eradicating ourselves before the government even has the chance?

This episode is an urgent call to rethink Indigenous citizenship and belonging before external forces dictate our future.

Join us in this critical conversation. Please share this episode, support Native-led media, and continue the fight for Indigenous rights. Consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to help sustain these discussions.

Big thanks to our team at Tidelands, our Patreon supporters, and all of you listening. Until next time… All My Relations.

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Support the show

Follow us on Instagram @amrpodcast, or support our work on Patreon. Show notes are published on our website, Allmyrelationspodcast.com. Matika's book Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America is available now! T'igwicid and Hyshqe for being on this journey with us.