By Phoebe Farris (Powhatan-Pamunkey)
At this 12 months’s Nationwide Native Media Convention, held August 10-12, 2023, in Winnipeg, Canada, members of the Native American Journalists Association voted to alter their title to the Indigenous Journalists Affiliation (IJA). President Graham Lee Brewer (Cherokee) issued statements about worldwide Indigenous journalists asserting themselves in newsrooms because the rightful storytellers of their very own narratives and harassed “connecting with our brothers and sisters throughout the globe from Canada to New Zealand.” Addressing members on the convention and in postings, Brewer and different IJA employees and board members emphasised the common struggles Indigenous individuals face in print and TV information media and the challenges of working inside buildings that weren’t designed for Indigenous individuals to thrive.
NAJA/IJA acknowledges that Indigenous Peoples north and south of the Medication Line (also referred to as the U.S.-Canadian border), all through Turtle Island, and all over the world are distinct teams based mostly on their very own traditions and cultures. The group sponsors journalism packages that promote range, defend challenges to freedom of speech, and encourage each mainstream and Indigenous media to realize excessive requirements of professionalism, ethics, and duty.
Graham Lee Brewer (Cherokee), outgoing President of the IJA Board of Administrators.
Altering the title from the Native American Journalists Affiliation to the Indigenous Journalists Affiliation introduced challenges for a lot of members, however Brewer’s remark that “We stay in a time when it’s attainable to attach and create deep, significant relationships with Indigenous journalists regardless of the place they’re, and we sit up for serving to them discover one another to share their data and help,” helped to make clear the significance of this vital transition.
Along with tutorial analysis papers and panel discussions, the Nationwide Native Media Convention featured particular occasions together with movie screenings at an off-site theater, stay performances, award ceremonies, and a silent public sale. Every day there have been oral land acknowledgments, along with the land acknowledgment on the lodge’s entrance that acknowledged Treaty 1 Territory, Crossroads of the Ojibway, Cree, Oji-Cre, Dene, and Dakota Peoples, the Purple River Valley–the birthplace of the Métis, Inuit family within the north and the ancestral lands they name residence, and water sourced from Shoal Lake 40 First Nation.
The opening reception included leisure from the Norman Chief Memorial Dancers. Based in 2004 in reminiscence of the late Norman Chief, a Manitoba musician, singer, and entertainer, the group performs conventional type Métis music and dance, particularly fast-paced jig dancing that features viewers participation.
Norman Chief Memorial Dancers. Based in 2004 in reminiscence of the late Norman Chief, a Manitoba musician, singer, and dancer who promoted conventional Métis music and dance.
Off-site movie screenings featured administrators, producers, filmmakers, and solid Q&As. MSNBC’s “The Tradition Is: Indigenous Ladies,” hosted by community contributor Alyssa London (Tlingit), led off a roundtable dialogue of activist Indigenous ladies who shared how they overcame adversity to succeed in their respective profession objectives whereas caring for household and advocating for his or her Tribal communities. After the screening, London, IJA Government Director and award profitable “Dangerous Press” co-director Rebecca Landsberry-Baker (Muscogee), Mvskoke Media director and “Dangerous Press” star Angel Ellis (Muscogee), and moderator Richard Lui, MSNBC anchor and documentary filmmaker, participated in a full of life Q&A.
CBC Radio hosted a non-public screening of “Dangerous Press,” adopted by a Q&A with co-directors and producers Landsberry-Baker and Joe Peeler, and Ellis, moderated by Bryan Pollard (Cherokee) from the Related Press. The movie offers with the Muscogee Nation’s censorship of their free speech by Tribal officers, the reporters who fought to show their Tribal governments’ corruption, and the way that battle impacted different Indian Nation Tribal media.
A variety of subjects was lined on the convention, together with reporting on repatriation, overlaying local weather in world Indigenous communities, post-secondary schooling alternatives, freedom of knowledge, group broadcasters and the significance of native information, reporting on boarding and residential colleges, 2SLGBTQ+ group wants, and free digital instruments and methods for journalists.
Duncan McCue, recipient of the 2023 NAJA Medill Milestone Achievement Award, receiving a Star Quilt. On the left is Francine Compton (Sandy Bay Ojibway First Nation) and on the appropriate, Patty Loew (Dangerous River Band of Lake Superior Ojibwe).
A spotlight was the Native Media Award Banquet, the place IJA introduced the Richard LaCourse Award for Investigative Journalism to Graham Lee Brewer (Cherokee), the Elias Boudinot Free Press Award to the Aboriginal Peoples Tv Community, and the Tim Tiago Free Press Award to Jodi Rave Noticed Bear (Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation/Lakota). Attendees additionally had the chance to buy Indigenous artwork, clothes, jewellery, beaded gadgets, and books in the course of the silent public sale that raised funds to profit the IJA scholarship fund.
Jourdan Bennett-Begaye (Dine’) from Indian Nation Right now, holding her award for Skilled Division III Print/On-line Finest Digital Publication.
Featured Audio system
Among the many many audio system, presenters, and award recipients have been Darrell Stranger (Oji-Cree Peguis First Nation), anchor/producer of Aboriginal Peoples Tv Community Nationwide Information; Grand Chief Kathy Merrick (Cross Lake Band of Indians); Stephanie Scott (Roseau River Anishinabe First Nation), Government Director of the Nationwide Centre for Fact and Reconciliation; Loren Tapahe (Navajo), writer of Native Scene Publishing and first Vice President of the previous Native American Press Affiliation (now the IJA); Jim Compton, founder, govt producer, host, and programming director of APTN; Hevyn-Lee Martens (Brokenhead Ojibway Nation), youth coordinator for Treaty One and On-Reserve Brokenhead consultant for Treaty One’s Promise Keepers Youth Council; Duncan McCue (Chippewas of Georgina Island First Nation), CBC broadcaster and Affiliate professor of Carleton College’s Faculty of Journalism and Communication; Chief Gordon Bluesky (Brokenhead Ojibway Nation); Patty Loew (Dangerous River band of Lake Superior Ojibwe), Professor at Northwestern College’s Medill Faculty of Journalism and director of the Heart for Native American and Indigenous Analysis; Darren Brown (Cochiti/Choctaw), former NAJA board member, presently serving on the Station Advisory Committee of Native Public Media; Madeline Allakariallak (Inuk), director of manufacturing and post-production at Tagramiut Nipingat Inc.; Jodi Rave Noticed Bear (Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation/Lakota), founder and Government Director of the Indigenous Media Freedom Alliance; and Graham Lee Brewer (Cherokee), nationwide investigative reporter for NBC Information and outgoing president of IJA.
Phoebe Farris after profitable the silent public sale for Duncan McCue’s e book, “Decolonizing Journalism.”
Many because of IJA employees Rebecca Landsberry-Baker (Muscogee Nation), Government Director; Francine Compton (Sandy Bay Ojibway First Nation), Affiliate Director; Sterling Cosper (Muscogee Nation), Membership Supervisor; Justine Medina (Navajo Nation/Ho-Chunk/Menominee), Program Supervisor; and Sheena Roetman (Lakota/Muscogee Nation), Schooling Supervisor for his or her onerous work to make a memorable expertise for all of us.
–Phoebe Mills Farris, Ph.D. (Powhatan-Pamunkey) is a Purdue College Professor Emerita, photographer, and freelance artwork critic.
High photograph: L-R: Richard Lui; Alyssa London (Tlingit); Angel Ellis (Muscogee Creek); Rebecca Landsberry-Baker (Muscogee Creek), recipient of U.S. Documentary Particular Jury Prize: Freedom of Expression on the 2023 Sundance Movie Pageant.
Pictures by Phoebe Farris.
