Native America Calling

Native America Calling was at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Ill.

Host Shawn Spruce along with National Native News anchor Antonia Gonzales and Native Vote 2024 contributor Shaun Griswold from Source NM brought you special live coverage during Thursday night's acceptance speech by Vice President Kamala Harris.

Listen to the full broadcast or watch it on YouTube.

Hugo Morales (Mixtec) rose from his Indigenous family farming roots in Oaxaca, Mexico to found Radio Bilingue, the largest Latino radio network in the United States. The network continues to offer a diverse array of programming in English, Spanish, Mixtec, and Triqui languages. Morales earned money while going to school by picking fruit in California. Among his many accomplishments and honors, he ultimately earned a law degree from Harvard University. He continues his strong commitment to educate others. We'll hear from Morales about his journey and where he's going next.

Plus, we'll hear closing coverage of the 2024 Democratic National Convention with Native Vote 2024 contributor Shaun Griswold from Source NM.

Vice President Kamala Harris will wrap up the Democratic National Convention, a climax to the four-day political spectacle to launch the vice president into the home stretch toward the November election. A presidential candidate for barely a month, Harris makes her best case to lead the nation for the next four years. If voters choose Harris, what could her administration mean for Native Americans? We'll examine her record on the Indian Child Welfare Act, sovereignty, consultation, and honoring treaties. We'll draw from her work as a U.S. senator, California attorney general, and vice president when it comes to issues important to Native Americans.

Even if Vice President Kamala Harris wins the White House, her agenda is dependent on what happens in Congressional elections. Since entering the race a few short weeks ago, Harris’ favorability has risen in polls—and once wary Democratic candidates are starting to see her as a strength. We’ll discuss what’s at stake for Native issues when it comes to other national elections and whether Harris has momentum enough to make a difference in races other than her own.

Beyond building momentum for the presidential candidates, there is some work to do at the Democratic National Convention (DNC). Native delegates have a voice in developing the platform that Democrats look to as the blueprint to effect policy. How much of what the policy direction relates to issues important to Native Americans? We'll zero in on how sovereignty, ICWA, the trust responsibility, and consultation intersect with the mainstream push by Democrats and how that shows up in official party positions.

For their most important public gathering in the presidential election, Democrats have chosen to meet on the traditional lands of the Potawatomi, Ho-Chunk, Menominee, Ojibwe, Odawa, and a handful of other nations. The state has no established federally recognized tribes, but the number of Chicago citizens who identify as Native American has more than doubled in the past ten years. We’ll be in Chicago, talking with Native Chicago residents who are also clued in to the Democratic political process about what the party is doing to reach Native voters and what sets them apart from their political rivals.

Distinctly Native American artwork, fashion, and films converge again for the annual Santa Fe Indian Market, with at least 1,000 booths and somewhere around 100,000 visitors. Native America Calling is live from Santa Fe, hearing from Southwestern Association for Indian Arts representatives, 2023 Best In Show winner Jennifer Tafoya, curators from the Native Cinema Showcase, and others to get a preview of the largest juried Native art market in the world.

Violinist, composer, and producer Geneviève Gros-Louis has a busy schedule of solo and group performances and discussions leading up to the release of her new album that celebrates Wendat culture and talent. She captivated the audience at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival with a piece composed specifically for the premiere of the film, Killers of the Flower Moon. She also composed the score to a season of National Geographic’s series, Life Below Zero: First Alaskans. Gros-Louis returns to the Native America Calling studio with live performances of her work.

Plus, we’ll catch up with organizers of the Pathways Indigenous Arts Festival in Santa Fe, New Mexico this weekend. We’ll talk about the Native art, music and film being featured this weekend.

The Yaqui people fought for centuries against Spanish missionaries, miners, slave-traders, and the iron-fisted, anti-Indigenous rule of the Mexican government in the latter part of the 19th Century. Once the dominant culture in what is now Sonora, Yaqui populations were eventually diminished from conflict, disease, and even deportation out of their homelands. They eventually won back a significant portion of their traditional homeland in 1930. We recognize the Yaqui people on the anniversary of a significant battle alongside Mexican revolutionaries against both Mexican and American forces.

As an Ojibwe language teacher and expert on Native American history and issues, Anton Treuer has penned more than a dozen books that are required reading for some Native studies college courses. But Treuer turns to fiction in his newest work, Where Wolves Don’t Die. His first novel is for young readers and focuses on Ezra, a young Ojibwe teen living in Minneapolis. A serious crime prompts his family to move him to live with his grandfather on the Nigigoonsiminikaaning First Nation. There he encounters new insights into his family and culture as he navigates the consequences of circumstances beyond his control. Treuer joins us as the Native Bookshelf featured author.