CSEJ and NAP (Native American Programs) News

The show features an all Indigenous line up of musicians and the following segments:

“We need to dismantle settler colonialism in the United States. What Israel is doing to Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank shows the world that settler colonialism only speaks the language of violence,” observes Diné (Navajo) Prof. Melanie Yazzie, in excerpts from a wide-ranging reading and talk entitled “Decolonization or Extinction: Reclaiming Our Humanity Through Our Love for the Earth.” We reprise Yazzie’s talk from WSU Vancouver’s April 2024 conference on “Extraction, Militarism, and Climate Collapse,” Yazzie, co-host of the Red Power Hour podcast, draws on a November 2023 speech at the March on Washington for Palestine. And she reads excerpts from The Real Deal and Red Nation Rising, works that consolidate insights from more than 25 Indigenous organizers and intellectuals with The Red Nation media collective. Landback, she explains, is the “soundest environmental policy for a planet teetering on the brink of total ecological collapse.”

“It’s important to recognize that the consolidation of the modern colonial state and the rise of the fascist state occurred pretty much at the same time. The modern colonial state and the fascist state are both particular forms of capitalist states,” observed Robin D.G. Kelley, Gary B. Nash professor of History at UCLA and author of books including Race Rebels, Yo’ Mama’s DisFunktional, Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of and American Original, Africa Speaks, America Answers: Modern Jazz in Revolutionary Times and Freedom Dreams. We hear excerpts of his June 2025 talk entitled “Colonialism, Capitalism, and Fascism,” which was recorded for air on the weekly program Alternative Radio, hosted by David Barsamian.

And finally, we hear reflections from student organizers with the DocArts Initiative of Native American Programs and the Collective for Social and Environmental Justice (CSEJ) at WSU Vancouver on learning and challenging myths about Thanksgiving.

This Indigenous Peoples’ Day Program was produced in collaboration with students with WSU Vancouver’s Documentary Arts Initiative (DocArts), and features the following segments:

Missing and Murdered Indigenous People (MMIPs), “Man Camps”, and Fossil Fuels: An interview with MMIP advocates Mykel Johnson and Nimiipuu Mole Julian Ankney about organizing to address the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous people, and the role of the fossil fuel industry in fueling ongoing colonial violence against Indigenous people. Mykel Johnson is a member of the Multnomah Budget Advisory Council and NW Native Chamber tribal engagement business advisor. Julian Ankney is Director of Native American Programs at Washington State University Vancouver. Ankney’s brother Michael Murphy has been missing since 2018.

Indigenous Pathaways to Recovery: An interview with Dominique Arthur, a mentor with Painted House Recovery Center about recovery and healing from colonial violence by reconnecting with Indigenous culture.

Cultivating Indigenous Plant Knowledge and First Foods: An interview with Julian Ankney and Lakotat Cheyenne organizer Roben White about revitalizing Indigenous plant knowledge and cultivating First Foods on WSU Vancouver’s 350-acre campus with and Indigenous Traditional Ecological Cultural Knowledge (ITECK) garden. They speak about ITECK as an alternative to carbon-intensive global agribusines.

Nimiipuu Mole Julian Ankney hosts this decolonial Thanksgiving Show, which features the following segments:

Beginning in grade school, American school children are steeped in the American mythology of Thanksgiving, cosplaying pilgrims and their Wampanoag hosts peacefully breaking bread together to celebrate the harvest, erasing and sanitizing the history of the genocidal land grab that would play out in New England and across the country. But, as recorded in a plaque at Plymouth Rock, “Since 1970, Native Americans have gathered at noon …in Plymouth to commemorate a National Day of Mourning on the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday. Julian Ankney and Lakota Cheyenne organizer/activist Roben White talk about the brutal historical realities that underpin Thanksgiving and the ongoing Indigenous struggle to decolonize the holiday.

Less than two years after John Trudell’s wife, three children and mother-in-law were murdered in a house fire within hours of Trudell burning a U.S. flag outside FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C., Trudell gave a seering Thanksgiving Day speech unpacking the links between colonialism, capitalism, and U.S. militarism. We hear excerpts from the 1980 speech by the legendary spoken word poet, playwright, Vietnam-era veteran, and indefatigable activist with the American Indian movement. And we listen also to Trudell’s song honoring the legendary Oglala Lakota land and water defender Crazy Horse. 

Click on the title or image to listen to the program on KBOO Radio.

Image hosted by KBOO Radio, 2024. Caption: Wamsuta Frank James on the 1974 Day of Mourning at Plymouth Landing.