May 6, 2024
MESA has joyfully celebrated and supported University of Michigan students through its signature heritage months and grants program.
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Each year, we honor the histories, cultures and contributions of American citizens whose ancestors had lived in North America since time immemorial, hosting a wide range of events and opportunities that celebrate Native American culture with the University of Michigan campus community.
Native American Heritage Month at U-M is led by the Office of Multi-Ethnic Student Affairs' Native American Heritage Month Committee, in close partnership with the Native American Student Association.
ⓘ What is Native American Heritage Month? Although the first "American Indian Day" was celebrated in May 1916 in New York, a month-long recognition of Native Americans did not happen until 1990. That year, President George H.W. Bush signed a joint congressional resolution designating November as National American Indian Heritage Month. Since then, the title has expanded to celebrate the heritage, history, art, and traditions of American Indians and Alaska Natives.
Listing of events
Our campus-wide calendar includes events from multiple hosts and sponsors. When available, see event links below for details, and contact event organizers with inquiries about specific events.
Carillon Recital: Native American Heritage Month Kickoff
November 1, 2024 | 1:20 p.m.
Ann & Robert Lurie Carillon (Lurie Tower in Gerstacker Grove)
Sponsored by Department of Organ (SMTD)
Performers will play the Lurie Carillon, an instrument of 60 bells with the lowest bell (bourdon) weighing 6 tons. Visitors may take the elevator to level 2 to view the largest bells, or to level 3 to see the carillonist performing. (Visitors subject to acrophobia are recommended to visit level 2 only.) An optional spiral stairway between levels 2 and 3 allows for up-close views of some of the largest bells.
Western Fantasies: American Fame and the Indigenous Ironworkers that Built America
November 1, 2024 | 4:00 p.m.
3512 Haven Hall
Sponsored by Native American Studies
Allan Downey is Dakelh, Nak’azdli Whut’en, Canada Research Chair in Indigenous History, Nationhood, and Self-Determination, and Associate Professor of History and Indigenous Studies Department at McMaster University.
Disability Heathcare: A Native American Lens
November 6, 2024 | 3:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
Virtual (Zoom)
Sponsored by the U-M Center for Disability Health and Wellness (CDHW), with funding provided by the IDEAL RRTC and AHEAD-DC RRTC
Join us for a live panel discussion exploring the critical healthcare-related barriers, challenges and strengths experienced by Native Americans with
disabilities. This important conversation will bring together Native American community members and Native American healthcare providers as they share experiences and perspectives concerning the healthcare disparities in the Native American population. The discussion intends to heighten awareness of the systemic healthcare changes needed in Native American communities and methods of implementing these changes.
An American Indian in the Dental Profession
November 7, 2024 | 12:00 p.m.
School of Dentistry, 1011 N. University, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, Room G378
Sponsored by the School of Dentistry DEI - Multicultural Affairs Committee
Dr. Jessica A. Rickert, DDS, Anishinaabe Dental Outreach shares about her experiences as the first ever Native American female dentist and the importance of having representation in roles like hers.
F.A.M. Fridays
November 8, 2024 | 2:00 p.m.
Trotter Multicultural Center
Sponsored by Trotter Multicultural Center, Native American Student Association
F.A.M. Fridays is BACK! This monthly program series celebrates culture through food, art, and music. This month, we are celebrating Native American Heritage Month.
Rock Your Mocs!
November 15, 2024 | All day
What is Rock Your Mocs? Established 2011, Rock Your Mocs, is a worldwide Native American & Indigenous Peoples social media unity event held annually and during National Native American Heritage Month in the U.S.A. People wear their moccasins wherever their day takes them and many take a photo, or create a video/story, and upload to social media with the hashtag #rockyourmocs.
Ross School of Business Native American Heritage Month Conference: The intersection of Indigenous identities and business issues
November 12, 2024 | 10:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.
Ross School of Business, Robertson Auditorium
Sponsored by Stephen M. Ross School of Business
Please join us (you may filter in and out as your schedule allows)—We will begin at 10:00 am with drumming and song, and throughout the day we will have Native panelists speak on Native inspired fashion, balancing business and culture, and capital acquisition for Native businesses. Please join us for as much, or as little, as you can. Bring family members if you wish.
Writing Retreat
November 15, 2024 | 9:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m.
South Quad, Multicultural Lounge
Sponsored by Students of Color of Rackham and the Ford School Center for Racial Justice
Join SCOR and CRJ for a special writing retreat for graduate students. Breakfast and lunch provided.
Enduring Kinship Roundtable Conversations
November 15, 2024 | 10:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m.
Stamps Gallery, 201 South Division Street
Stamps Gallery is proud to present a day-long series of roundtable conversations entitled Enduring Kinship with Indigenous seed keepers, botanists, chefs, and artists. Free and open to the public. Limited space available; registration recommended for each program. These roundtable conversations are generously supported by the U‑M Arts Initiative and a Michigan Humanities Grant.
Feel Good Frybread
November 15, 2024 | 7:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m.
University of Michigan Museum of Art
Sponsored by Office of Multi-Ethnic Student Affairs, Native American Student Association, and UMMA
Join us for a free performance by Mato Wayuhi (Oglala Lakota), composer for the award winning FX/Hulu series Reservation Dogs, screenings of Living in Balance: Anishinaabe Star Knowledge, frybread by Eva and Robin Menefee of Anishnabe Meejim, book giveaways, hands-on art activities, and more!
Bad River Documentary Screening
November 19, 2024 | 6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
1040 Dana Building
RSVP Here
Sponsored by the Department of Earth & Environmental Science and the Program in the Environment (PitE)
Wisconsin's tribe's ongoing fight to protect Lake Superior for future generations. "Bad River" shows the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa's long history of activism and resistance in the context of continuing legal battles with Enbridge Energy over its Line 5 oil pipeline.
Creating Maawn Doobiigeng: Developing An Anishinaabe Classification System for a Tribal Library
November 21, 2024 | 3:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
Hatcher Graduate Library Gallery (Room 100) and Zoom
Sponsored by the University Library
Anne Heidemann & Melissa Isaac, from the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe of Michigan, talk about Maawn Doobiigeng, a new classification system for the Saginaw Chippewa Tribal Libraries. Join in person or via Zoom. Submit questions in advance via this form, and we'll respond to as many as time allows.
A Cloud Over the Land
November 24, 2024 | 2:00 p.m.
University of Michigan Museum of Art
Sponsored by UMMA
Deborah Richmond, the Tribal Historian of the Burt Lake Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, discusses “A Cloud over the Land,” the recently published book by historian and author Rick Wiles about the Burt Lake Burnout of 1900, an event memorialized in the exhibition “Andrea Carlson: Future Cache” currently on view at UMMA.
Book Launch with Dr. Bethany Hughes
December 6, 2024 | 3:00 p.m.
Michigan Union, Kuenzel Room, 1st Floor
Sponsored by the Office of Multi-Ethnic Student Affairs, Native American Studies, and the Native American Student Association
Join us for a reception celebrating the release of Dr. Bethany Hughes' first book!
Redface unearths the history of the theatrical phenomenon of redface in nineteenth- and twentieth-century America. Like blackface, redface was used to racialize Indigenous peoples and nations, and even more crucially, exclude them from full citizenship in the United States. Arguing that redface is more than just the costumes or makeup an actor wears, Bethany Hughes contends that it is a collaborative, curatorial process through which artists and audiences make certain bodies legible as “Indian.” By chronicling how performances and definitions of redface rely upon legibility and delineations of race that are culturally constructed and routinely shifting, this book offers an understanding of how redface works to naturalize a very particular version of history and, in doing so, mask its own performativity. Tracing the “Stage Indian” from its early nineteenth-century roots to its proliferation across theatrical entertainment forms and turn of the twenty-first century attempts to address its racist legacy, Redface uses case studies in law and civic life to understand its offstage impact. Hughes connects extensive scholarship on the “Indian” in American culture to the theatrical history of racial impersonation and critiques of settler colonialism, demonstrating redface’s high stakes for Indigenous and non-Indigenous alike. Revealing the persistence of redface and the challenges of fixing it, Redface closes by offering readers an embodied rehearsal of what it would mean to read not for the “Indian” but for Indigenous theater and performance as it has always existed in the US.
About the Author: Bethany Hughes is Assistant Professor at the University of Michigan in the Department of American Culture and a core faculty member in the Native American Studies Program. Her work can be found in Theatre Journal, Mobilities, Theatre Survey, American Periodicals, and Theatre Topics.
Related news
Daily highlights power of community and expression through U-M heritage months
Wilkerson named to assistant director role supporting Native American students
October 30, 2023
The Office of Multi-Ethnic Student Affairs (MESA) is thrilled to announce that Andrea Wilkerson has been named the office's first assistant director of Native American student enrichment and belonging. Andrea has served as a MESA program manager since 2019 and now joins Nadia Bazzy and Krishna Han in MESA leadership.
Have any questions?
Contact event organizers with inquiries about specific events. Other questions? Contact [email protected].