Two adolescent cousins—one from the city and one from the rez—bond during a summer herding sheep on their grandmother's Navajo Nation ranch in the 1990s. They learn about their family's past and themselves. That’s the story told in a new Native-led indie comedy Frybread Face and Me. Writer and director Billy Luther (Navajo/Hopi/Laguna Pueblo) creates a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age story starring Martin Sensmeier. Today on Native America Calling, Billy Luther takes your calls along with Morningstar Angeline (Navajo, Chippewa, Blackfoot, Shoshone), who plays Ann, and Nasheen Sleuth (Diné), who plays Aunt Sharon.

The federal government is mulling a plan to extend the height of the Shasta Dam in California. That would raise the level of the reservoir, permanently submerging even more of the sacred land cherished by the Winnemem Wintu and other tribes upstream. It also further diminishes hopes of restoring salmon runs to the levels the tribes once counted on as sustenance and ceremony. A new podcast A Prayer For Salmon explores the tribal connections to the rivers and documents efforts to not only halt the dam expansion, but to build momentum to remove the 1945 dam completely. Today on Native America Calling, we hear highlights from the podcast and learn more about the federal plan.

Listen or read the latest headlines from National Native News with Antonia Gonzales

Kahulehele Farmstead on the Oneida Nation reservation in Wisconsin is developing a traditional food bartering system. 

Bleu Adams (Mandan/Hidatsa/Diné) joins a list of 80 volunteer chefs working with the U.S. State Department's American Culinary Corps to build diplomatic connections around the globe through food. 

Shinnecock ambassador Lance Gumbs (Shinnecock) explains his tribe's mastery of the ubiquitous Northeast staple: the lobster roll.

And, by popular demand, a Navajo-owned bakery expands and creates a tea room for tea time.

Today on Native America Calling, Andi Murphy delivers a new helping of our regular feature The Menu with Jen Falck (Oneida Nation Wisconsin), owner and operator of Kahulahele Farmstead; Lance Gumbs, tribal ambassador for the Shinnecock Nation, former tribal chairman, and owner of the Shinnecock Lobster Factory; Bleu Adams, chef, entrepreneur, IndigeHub director, and a member of the U.S. State Department's Diplomatic Culinary Partnership American Culinary Corps; and Jacqueline Ahasteen (Diné), owner of I Knead Sugar bakery and tea room.

The Biden Administration is set to sign off on the beginning phases of an oil drilling plan in Alaska that promises big dividends for Alaska Native corporations and the state. The Willow Project could ultimately produce 180,000 barrels a day and perhaps 300 long-term jobs. But, in addition to the other potential environmental damages, the drilling comes in the same place where climate change is melting permafrost and villages are having to move out of the way of rising sea levels. Today on Native America Calling, we hear from both sides of this timely and contentious debate with Nagruk Harcharek (Iñupiaq), president of the Voices of the Arctic Iñupiat; Doreen Leavitt (Iñupiaq), director of natural resources for the Iñupiat Community of the Arctic Slope; State Rep. Josiah Patkotak (I-AK); Eunice Brower (Inupiaq), tribal treasurer for Nuiqsut; Adam Ortega, communications coordinator for Alaska Community Action on Toxics; and Deloole’aanh Erickson (from the village of Kaltag), environmental justice director for the Native Movement.

Larry Casuse was shot to death by Gallup, NM police in 1973 as he carried out a desperate, radical act to try and help his people. Casuse was still a teenager, trying to call attention to unscrupulous business practices at a bar that was the epicenter of a disproportionate number of Native American deaths. His frustration boiled over when the bar’s owner—the city’s mayor—kept getting rewarded instead of punished by elected leaders. Today on Native America Calling, we learn about this forgotten story from a complicated era with John Redhouse (Diné and Ute), longtime Native American activist; David Correia, associate professor of American Studies at the University of New Mexico and the author of Enemy Such As This: Larry Casuse and the Fight for Native Liberation in One Family on Two Continents over Three Centuries; investigative journalist Marley Shebala (Diné and Zuni); and Lenny Foster (Diné), spiritual advisor for Leonard Peltier and retired program supervisor for the Navajo Nation Corrections Project.

New Mexico just joined the growing list of states to cap loan interest rates at 36%. While still onerous compared to conventional bank loans, it’s a far cry from the up to 175% annual interest rates some store front businesses were charging. In New Mexico, proponents of the interest rate limit noted that 60% of the high interest establishments were within 10 miles of Native reservation boundaries. Today on Native America Calling, we find out about how interest rate caps work and what alternatives there are for low-income or low credit score borrowers with Ahtza Dawn Chavez (Diné/Kewa Pueblo), executive director of NAVA; Kristina Fisher, associate director at Think New Mexico; and Kristen Stambach, director of lending at Four Bands.

Fifty years later, it’s hard to paint an adequate picture of the injustice, corruption, oppression, and chaos that led up to and pervaded the occupation of Wounded Knee, SD starting on February 27, 1973. Afterwards, as he dismissed misconduct charges against AIM leaders Russell Means and Dennis Banks, Federal Judge Fred Nichol famously said the FBI had “polluted the waters of justice.” Today on Native America Calling, we hear from people who were there and discuss what the event means a half century later with Dwain Camp (Ponca), warrior from Wounded Knee and elder; Walter Littlemoon (Oglala Lakota and Northern Cheyenne), resident of the 1973 Wounded Knee occupation; and policy analyst Russ Diabo (Kahnawake Mohawk).

Julian Brave NoiseCat (Canim Lake Band Tsq’escen) is a writer, filmmaker, and former champion powwow traditional dancer currently working on his first novel. His columns in publications like the New York Times, the Washington Post, and The New Yorker highlighting underreported stories contributed to his winning the American Mosaic Journalism Prize in 2022. He is currently the visiting fellow at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy's Center for Racial Justice. NoiseCat previously worked as a progressive policy analyst and political strategist. Friday on Native America Calling, we learn more about NoiseCat’s life and career in our regular feature, Native in the Spotlight.

One photographic exhibit at the National Museum of the American Indian packs three powerful essays from Native photographers: the culture and people of the Genizaro in New Mexico, diversity and complexity faced by couples weighing blood quantum as they build a family, and the Navajo heroes and community during the worst days of the COVID-19 pandemic. Today on Native America Calling, we guide you through the “Developing Stories” exhibit with Tailyr Irvine (Salish and Kootenai), photojournalist and co-founder of Indigenous Photograph; Donovan Quintero (Diné), assistant editor at the Navajo Times; and Russel Albert Daniels (Diné and Ho-Chunk).

The Biden Administration is getting ready to declare an official end to the COVID-19 public health emergency. Several states and cities have already done so. Health officials also suggest contracting and recovering from the virus provides significant protection against serious illness, but say that isn’t an excuse to forego vaccinations. Today on Native America Calling, we assess where we are in the lingering threat the pandemic poses for Native nations with Dean Seneca (Seneca), CEO of Seneca Scientific Solutions+ and adjunct professor at the School of Public Health and health Professions at the University of Buffalo; Dr. Rachel Bender Ignacio, adjunct assistant professor in the Department of Epidemiology School of Public Health and an assistant professor of medicine focusing on allergy and infectious diseases at the University of Washington; Kody Becenti (Diné), second year medical student at the University of New Mexico.