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The No. 1 men’s college basketball team in the country is headed by an Indigenous coach for the first time in history.
Kelvin Sampson, Lumbee, is in his ninth season at the helm of the University of Houston Cougars, who are ranked first by The Associated Press for the NCAA Division I men’s team.
The Cougars, 9-0, remained “firmly entrenched” at the top of the AP rankings for a second week – the first time since the program’s “Phi Slama Jama” days in the 1980s led by player Hakeem Olajuwan, AP reported.
“I play how I see the game,” Sampson told ICT this week. “I coach how I see the game. I made mistakes when I was a younger coach. I made more mistakes then than I do now. I got better as I got older.”
“I got knocked down and I got up every time,” he said. “I learn from mistakes.” READ MORE — Dan Ninham, Special to ICT
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I grew up in a border town with one of the most well-known flea markets near the Navajo Nation and I have always appreciated the artistry, brilliance and entrepreneurial spirit of my community. My parents, little brother and I would jump into our silver GMC Sierra and drive down the road to the Gallup Flea Market almost every Saturday since I could remember.
In November, the flea market opens for Black Friday and in the days leading up to Christmas, it’s open for vendors. On top of that, my community loves bazaars and the holiday markets that pop-up.
In that spirit of trying to recreate virtually the flea markets, bazaars and holiday markets I grew up loving, I have curated a list of Indigenous vendors whose work I admire. READ MORE — Pauly Denetclaw, ICT
It’s not uncommon for Alaskans to carry specialty foods back and forth on airplane flights, whether it’s muktuk (whale blubber and skin) from the Chukchi coast, herring eggs from Sitka or Krispy Kreme donuts from Anchorage.
But in November, just two days before Thanksgiving, a Cessna Caravan arrived in the Inupaiq community of Anaktuvuk Pass up in the Brooks Range carrying more than 2,000 pounds of bowhead whale.
“That was a really big blessing for them to send whale meat and muktuk and fish and share their catch with us,” said Casey Edwards, who sits on the Anaktuvuk Pass city council and helped facilitate the shipment from a whaling captain in Nuiqsut, 144 miles farther north toward the Beaufort Sea coast.
“We brought it all to the city and then a bunch of people volunteered to cut it up into small cubes,” Edwards said. After that, it was distributed at the community’s Thanksgiving feast. READ MORE — Zachariah Hughes, Anchorage Daily News
CHICAGO — For the last 12 years, photographer Sharon Hoogstraten of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation has been capturing the joy and resilience of citizens of all nine Potawatomi nations reflected through their dance and regalia.
Inspired by her discovery of a photograph of a long-ago ancestor at the Wilmette Historical Society, she wanted to preserve photographs of current Potawatomi citizens for future generations, in vibrant color with smiling faces and laughter.
“Photography is a way to tell a story,” Hoogstraten told ICT recently. “It opened up a whole new world for me. It’s storytelling, and in Native life, storytellers are a guardian of your history.”
Her work has now been published in a new book, “Dancing for Our Tribe: Potawatomi Tradition in the New Millennium,” by the University of Oklahoma Press, featuring tribal citizens in their own regalia.
She traveled to each of the Potawatomi nations to photograph those who showed up, starting with the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians, located between Chicago and Kalamazoo, Michigan. She would later travel to her own nation, the Citizen Potawatomi Nation in Oklahoma, as well those in Kansas, Ontario and elsewhere in Michigan. READ MORE — Amelia Schafer, Special to ICT
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When a museum decides to make a new exhibit, a lot of detailed planning goes into that effort. Right now, curators, designers and others are busy preparing a new exhibit at the High Desert Museum in Bend, Oregon. Museum executive director Dana Whitelaw joins us with all the details on the upcoming exhibit.
In the Rocky Mountains and Southwestern parts of the country many homes on tribal lands still rely on wood stoves to heat their homes in the winter. ICT Senior Correspondent Patty Talahongva has more on the U.S. Forest Service’s $10 million Wood for Life program.
Pueblo of Laguna citizen Shaun Griswold a senior reporter for Source New Mexico. Shaun reports on issues important to Native Americans in urban and tribal communities throughout the state, including education and child welfare. He joins us to talk about his latest reporting.
The Inuit Circumpolar Council has some uphill battles it’s waging. One is to stir action internationally to address climate change despite the loss of a major international forum, the Arctic Council. Another is to continue to collaborate with Chukotkans, or Russian Inuit, despite the war in Ukraine.
The council represents 180,000 Inuit from Alaska (USA), Canada, Chukotka (Russia), and Greenland. It has worked since 1972 to protect and promote Inuit rights, ways of life and unity, and the Arctic environment.
According to the council, the United Nations international climate convention held in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt in November brought both progress and setbacks.
In the council’s view, the UN climate convention made progress when it agreed to form a Loss and Damage Fund to compensate the most vulnerable people for climate change losses. READ MORE— Joaqlin Estus, ICT
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What’s trending on social media:
- Brittney Griner freed in swap for Russian arms dealer Bout: The swap achieved a top goal for President Joe Biden but carried a heavy price
- Grand Ronde citizens vote to limit disenrollment: Many say the move to amend the tribe’s constitution is a critical step in community healing after painful disenrollments a decade ago divided tribal citizens
- Oklahoma tribal leaders say synergy felt at tribal summit: This year’s panelists discussed topics such as mental health and health equity, economic development, tribal homeland initiatives and climate and clean energy
- Interracial marriages to get added protection under new law
- The next World Cup will jump to 48 teams. Is bigger better?
- Mauna Loa lava no longer imminent threat to Hawaii highway
We want your tips, but we also want your feedback. What should we be covering that we’re not? What are we getting wrong? Please let us know. dalton@ictnews.org.
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