Department of Social Work Education
Title IV-E Harry Specht Memorial Symposium 2024
Preserving Indigenous Rights: An Exploration of ICWA’s
2023 Re-Affirmation and Native American Sovereignty
Dr. Cutcha Risling Baldy
BIO:
Dr. Cutcha Risling Baldy is an Associate Professor and Department Chair of Native American Studies at Humboldt State University. Her research is focused on Indigenous feminisms, California Indians and decolonization. She received her Ph.D. in Native American Studies with a Designated Emphasis in Feminist Theory and Research from the University of California, Davis and her M.F.A. in Creative Writing & Literary Research from San Diego State University. She also has her B.A. in Psychology from Stanford University. She has published in the Ecological Processes Journal, the Wicazo Sa Review, and the Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education and Society journal. She has also published creative writing in the As/Us journal and News from Native California. She is also the author of a popular blog that explores issues of social justice, history and California Indian politics and culture. www.cutcharislingbaldy.com/blog
Dr. Risling Baldy's first book We Are Dancing For You: Native feminisms and the revitalization of women's coming-of-age ceremonies uses a framework of Native Feminisms to locate revitalization within a broad context of decolonizing praxis and considers how this renaissance of women's coming-of-age ceremonies confounds ethnographic depictions of Native women; challenges anthropological theories about menstruation, gender, and coming-of-age; and addresses gender inequality and gender violence within Native communities. The book is available with the University of Washington Press.
Dr. Risling Baldy is Hupa, Yurok and Karuk and an enrolled member of the Hoopa Valley Tribe in Northern California. She grew up practicing the traditional ways of her people and values the lessons and knowledge that she gained from these experiences. In 2007, Dr. Risling Baldy co-founded the Native Women's Collective, a nonprofit organization that supports the continued revitalization of Native American arts and culture. She lives in Humboldt County with her husband, daughter, and a puppy named Buffy.
Angela Kaster
BIO:
Angela grew up in Fresno, California. She has been married for 15 years and has five children. She is a Tribal member from North Fork Mono Rancheria.
Working with the Native community is her passion. She thrives to make a difference and advocates for the Native community. She was a former foster child who was lost in the child welfare system. She has beaten all odds to be where she is today and built a strong foundation for herself, her family, and her children.
Angela received her Associate's degree in Social Work, Human Resources certificate, Native American Arts certificate, and Resources for American Indian Needs at Fresno City College. She completed her internships at Fresno Community Hospital and Madera County. She has her Bachelor’s degree in Social Work and is currently in the Social Work program part-time at Fresno State University working on her Master’s.
She is a full-time ICWA Representative with Santa Rosa Rancheria. She advocates for the families she works with. She helps families be successful during the hardest time of their lives. She provides resources and tools. She accompanies Kings County CPS for investigations, referrals, home contacts, family meetings, and assists with adoptions.
Sandy White Hawk
BIO:
Sandy White Hawk is a survivor of America’s Indian Adoption Era who helps generations
of displaced relatives find their way, home through song and ceremony. For Sandy White
Hawk, the story of the Adoption Era is not one of saving children but of destroying
families and tribes. At 18 months of age, Sandy was removed from her Sicangu Lakota
relatives and placed with white missionaries over four hundred miles from the reservation.
Growing up as the only brown girl in a small Wisconsin town, Sandy’s cultural identity
was rejected, leaving her feeling ugly, alone, and unworthy of love. After a 30-year
struggle through abuse and recovery, Sandy set out to restore the missing pieces of
her stolen past. She soon discovered that her adoption was not an isolated case but
part of a nationwide assimilative movement that had effectively displaced one-third
of children from
tribal communities nationwide. Through Sandy’s journey of coming home, she discovered
the powerful role that traditional song and ceremony can play in healing this intergenerational
wound. Today, she is an international child welfare advocate and has assisted countless
displaced relatives and their families through
the process of reunification. Blood Memory explores the communal healing that is sparked
by the return of this stolen generation, as Sandy helps organize the first annual
Welcome Home Ceremony for Adopted and Foster Relatives of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe
- the community from which she was removed over 60 years ago.
Blood Memory
Battles over blood quantum and ‘best interests’ resurface the untold history of America’s Indian Adoption Era - a time when nearly one-third of children were removed from tribal communities nationwide. As political scrutiny over Indian child welfare intensifies, an adoption survivor helps others find their way home through song and ceremony.
https://www.bloodmemorydoc.com/
Supreme Court Decision
Haaland, Secretary of the Interior, ET AL. v. Brackeen ET AL.
This is the link to the Supreme Court Decision for the case concerning ICWA decided on June 15, 2023.
Other Links
DSS Office of Tribal Affairs
https://www.cdss.ca.gov/inforesources/tribal-affairs
Bobby Von Martin
