Ade’ and welcome to the first episode of Xilegg: Our Arctic Presence.

In this episode, originally recorded in late October of 2019, we visit with Unangax̂ scholar, activist, and performance artist Haliehana Stepetin.

During our conversation we touch on the mapping of Indigenous spacialities that help us imagine and construct our understanding of the world as contemporary Indigenous peoples rooted in the constellations of our ancestors. Haliehana also speaks to her relationship with Iqyax (kayak) building.

Haliehana Stepetin is Unangax̂ and was born and raised in the village of Akutan in Alaska's Aleutian Islands. She brings this upbringing into her re-search theorizing subsistence cosmologies as the central component connecting aspects of Unangax and Indigenous ways of knowing in the diverse topics of study she engages. Haliehana is a PhD student in Native American Studies at the University of California Davis. Haliehana is a scholar and activist, an Unangax̂ dancer, choreographer, Indigenous performance artist, Unangam Tunuu learner and Indigenous language activist, subsistence practitioner, and Navy veteran. Her scholarship engages Indigenous performance as embodied knowledge to (re)center Indigenous Knowledge systems in education and academia with, by, and for Indigenous and Alaska Native communities.

Follow Haliehana’s work:
Website: https://www.haliehana.com/about.html
IG: @indigenous_agent

Referenced in this episode –

Mark My Words : Native Women Mapping Our Nations by Mishuana Goeman
Find her book here:
https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/mark-my-words

Falling From the Night Sky by Joy Harjo
Visit Poet Laureate Joy Harjo’s site here:
https://www.joyharjo.com/

Tattooist -Sarah Whalen-Lunn
IG:@inkstitcher

Contribute to the Native Scholarship Fund for Backcountry Avalanche Training in partnership with Coalition Snow!
Contribute here: https://www.coalitionsnow.com/blogs/blog/native-scholarship-fund
And follow Coalition Snow @coalitionsnow

Music in this Episode brought to you by BedTrack’s Storyteller Initiative
Song 1: MotherBear
Song 2: Nation to Nation

Our Website: onthelandmedia.org
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