A Gentle Nudge.

Artist Pasckie Pascua. Woman and Red Flowers. 2017.

After procrastination, excuses, and a talk with the Creator, the idea feels good, fear leaves you and you are ready to believe in the magic of new beginnings.
by jojo brooks shifflett  

Anita Jo Shifflett, Lumbee author and lawyer. September 2017.

Contempary NDN women



Maya Vildosola

by C. Davis photography



Native woman's tats

 

CONTRASTS in Beauty

Nikki Lee

Dolly Assinewe by Bruno Henry Photography
on Feb. 10, 2009

The best of our People...

Mary Pryor, BET Networks

Native Spirit

NATIVE AMERICAN MODEL: Asanna Strowbridge

Asanna Strowbridge models for Native Model Studio.
Her hair was done by Jasmin Hall Eastman.
Tyson Anderson Photography again did the photography. 

NATIVE AMERICAN MODEL: Lisa Muswagon

native american model Lisa Muswagon
works at Native Model Studio, She is wearing earrings
by Acahkos Designs. The photo is from
Tyson Anderson Photography

NATIVE AMERICAN MODEL

Brittany Katherine, a Native American model,
posed in May of 2012
by Tyson Anderson Photography

Brittany Katherine

Brittany Katherine

beautiful dancer in regalia

beautiful dancer in regalia

FIERCE

Sayisi Dene posing in Churchill, Manitoba
for Native Model Studio in 2012
by Tyson Anderson Photography

ENCOURAGEMENT FOR SOVEREIGN NATIONS' ACTIVISTS

mikaela crank red nations model

“I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving.  We must sail sometimes with the wind, and sometimes against it, but we must sail and cannot drift nor lie at anchor.”

 –Oliver Wendell Holmes

AFRICAN RED WOMAN

“The transposition of the theme of African womanhood is embodied within African-Native American women throughout the Red Diaspora. The thematic thrust of her meaning in the worlds of mankind is majestic and colorful. It is as contradictory as an assertion of power into worlds that deny Mother’s power yet yearn for it and need its force upon consciousness to shift and change. The music of African Red women of the Red Nations is multi-themed, singular in its devouring appetite for recognition, truth telling, and stories for her children and children's children growth. All of the Red nations who married African women bear her resemblance and her blood is their bloodlines. It is in you. It is in me.” ©Gregory E. Woods 

Michelle Sujai (seated) & Miccusukee Indians in 2010

a time in my life . . .

 MAYAN WOMAN

“In the 1990's a small group of Mayans made the trip to a powwow held by the Piscataway nation in Charles County, Maryland. The most memorable things were the Eagle dance they performed and the arresting beauty of the lead dancer who resembled the woman in this photo.” – Dawn Wolf, Keeper of Stories

BOBBY ALLEN, Native American radio announcer

“Intelligence and introspection should be one word. Thoughtfulness designs the structure of one's state of mind. The concept of merging believes in the individual and the group. It, the process of merging, has historically been the sustaining trait of the Cherokee people, and other indigenous nations. It is an important and missing element of the last 10 years as has been the voice of American women of depth, power, and introspective gazes into the meat of issues that affect and create life in the face of the death of ideas, misconceptions, babies, and hope…



More could have been learned and understood about September the 11th looking deeply into your face than using that day to reflect and see this nation through the paradigm of dictatorial patriotism.” – Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories

Bobby Allen

Bobby Allen
www.tribalvoiceradio.com

Turning Conflict Into Art

Native American woman Junal Gerlach in her power

There is real difficulty in naming, acknowledging, and owning the experience of violation, and potentially trauma, which can sometimes occur in intense conflicts. It can be even more challenging to move on from conflicts that offer no balm or accountability for the unethical actions of others. We can be hurt so deeply when the acknowledgement of our voice, our perspective, our strength, and the integrity of our intentions is refused. The 'easy', (and sometimes brutish) route of blaming and scapegoating for a conflict situation emerges when another's humanity is denied.


Speaking truth to power is one of the most paradoxically powerful and vulnerable forms of conflict that emerges in our world. Toxic authority — both the kind that is entrenched in outer systems, as well as in inner ways of relating that are learned behaviours - does not like to be challenged, or have its actions questioned in any way. Toxic power can respond to questioning with rage, panic, and ruthlessness. Rather than allow the truth to emerge, cover-ups and denial are the learned modes of operating, thereby creating more and more confusion and despair within the self-regulating system of life. Healthy life systems have their own exquisitely tuned feedback loops, which are always co-creating towards greater self-expression, self-expansion and wholeness.


Learning from the dance of opposites that we find in the natural world, we see the stunning co-creativity that is constantly at work in all dynamics. If we could remember, and truly trust this instinct and impulse, our trauma could potentially become the canvas of the greatest form of expression of the deepest source of our selves. The artist of life, through honouring and expressing the comedy and tragedy of the dance can turn painful conflict into an exquisite new creation.


By MARIA VAMVALIS
MAY 21, 2010
http://rememberingtheancientdeer.blogspot.com/2010/05/turning-conflict-into-art.html

FORGIVENESS, NDN country & the soul

Junal Gerlach

Everything is negotiable.
Everythin is forgiveable.

The story of abuse, and the darkness behind the image of deep Native spirituality, and cultural superiority toted by many people needs to be told. White America needs to hold on to an image of the Indian that tells precious little about the consequences of conquest, rape, religious intolerance, and cultural contempt that spoiled the land, and relations between the red and white people. Junal Gerlach has a story.

Her video is raw, and to the point: http://www.junalgerlach.com/movie.html