Past Events

Symposium Archive 2004

Native Lands
Contemporary American Indian Story and Performance

A symposium & festival at Georgetown University
April 15, 16, & 17, 2004

Hear clips from the symposium | Schedule of Events

A celebration of groundbreaking American Indian story and performance in the new millenium.

Joining the richness of traditional voices to the experiences of today, contemporary American Indian artists, writers, and performers are producing works that challenge, surprise, and inspire. Just months before the opening of the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington DC, Georgetown University is proud to host the Native Lands conference, April 15-17, on the Georgetown campus. Co-sponsored by the Museum and the Lannan Foundation, Native Lands will present a remarkable group of poets, novelists, film-makers and playwrights, a singing group, as well as a keynote address by Richard West, Director of the Museum.

Prof. Lucy Maddox, Conference Director Prof. David Gewanter, 2003-04 Lannan Program Director

All events will be held on the campus of Georgetown University.

Thursday, April 15

5:15pm
Intercultural Center Auditorium
Keynote Address
by W. Richard West: Native America in the 21st Century: Out of the Mists and Beyond Myth
(Richardson Lecture, sponsored by the Georgetown American Studies Program)

W. Richard West, attorney and member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma, is director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian, which opens to the public in Sept. 2004.

6:30pm Reception

Friday, April 16

10-11:30am
McNeir Auditorium
Lives, Poems, Stories: Laura Tohe & Craig Womack

Laura Tohe was born on the Navajo Reservation and now teaches at Arizona State University. Her books of poetry include Making friends with Water and No Parole Today, and her work has been anthologized in collections such as Songs from This Earth on Turtle's Back and Fever Dreams.

Craig Womack (Oklahoma Creek- Cherokee) teaches Native American literature at the University of Oklahoma and is the author of Red on Red, a literary history of the Creek Nation, and Drowning in Fire, a novel.

1:15-2:30pm
McNeir Auditorium
New Music: Sisters: the Nettukkusq singers
In the Natick dialect of Algonquin, "Nettukkusq" means my sister. The Nettukkusq Singers use traditional and contemporary song to increase awareness of the presence and persistence of southern New England Indian peoples and tribal nations. The members are: Patricia Baptista- Reis (Wampanoag/Cherokee/ Nipmuck); Pamela Thomas Ellis (Nipmuc); Dolores Quartey Hazard (Nipmuc); Deborah Spears Moorehead (Wampanoag); Ojetta Silas (Miami/Nipmuc); Emily Thomas (Lakota).

3-4:30pm
McNeir Auditorium
Tribal Dramas: a staged reading of William S. Yellow Robe Jr's play, Better-n-Indians, directed by Bob Jaffe. A discussion will follow.

William S. Yellow Robe, Jr., playwright, poet, and actor, is Artistic Director of No Borders Indigenous Inter-Tribal Theatre Company, and the resident Playwright at Trinity Repertory (Providence, RI). His plays have appeared at the Public Theater/NY Shakespeare Festival, Seattle Group Theater, American Conservatory Theater, the Mark Taper Forum, and elsewhere. Five of his plays are published as Where the Pavement Ends.

Bob Jaffe, actor and director, is Producing Director of The Night Kitchen company.

7-9 pm
McNeir Auditorium
Walking the Future, Words and Stories: Susan Power and LeAnne Howe
Susan Power is an enrolled member of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe. She has a J.D. from Harvard Law School and an MFA from the Iowa Writer's Workshop. Her first novel, Grass Dancer, won the Hemingway Foundation award. Her latest work, Roofwalker, is a collection of short fiction and personal essays.

LeAnne Howe (Choctaw), who has taught at Wake Forest, Grinnell, and on the Rosebud Rerservation, is a playwright and author of Shell Shaker, a novel tracing the history of women of a Choctaw family from the 18th century to the present. A film based on her screenplay about Native Americans in the 21st century will be shown on PBS in November.

Sat., April 17

10-11:30am
McNeir Auditorium
Clay, Ink, Film: New Visions: Nora Naranjo-Morse

Nora Naranjo-Morse, from Santa Clara Pueblo, is a sculptor, writer, and producer of films that examine the continuing changes within Pueblo culture. Her book Mud Woman combines poetry and images of her clay sculpture. Her work is currently being exhibited at the Gustave Heye Center of the National Museum of the American Indian in New York.

1-2:30pm
McNeir Auditorium
Story & Performance: Next Steps Panel Discussion
with:
Craig Womack
William S. Yellow Robe, Jr,
LeAnne Howe
Susan Power
Nora Naranjo-Morse
Lucy Maddox, Georgetown University, Moderator

Reception