Honoring Indigenous Voices:
Celebrating Native American Heritage Month at the Michael Schwartz Library
Each November, the Michael Schwartz Library joins the nation in celebrating Native American Heritage Month, a time to recognize the rich histories, diverse cultures, and ongoing contributions of Indigenous peoples across the United States. This month offers an opportunity to learn, reflect, and engage with Native stories — not only through history books, but through contemporary literature, film, art, and scholarship that continue to shape our shared understanding of the world.
Acknowledging the Land We Share
Cleveland State University stands on the traditional lands of the Erie, Wyandot, and other Indigenous nations who lived, worked, and cared for this region long before it became known as Ohio. By acknowledging this history, we honor the resilience and stewardship of these communities and reaffirm our commitment to respect and education.
Explore Indigenous Perspectives
Throughout November, the Library invites the CSU community to explore materials that highlight Indigenous voices and experiences:
FEATURED READS
- There There by Tommy Orange
A wondrous and shattering award-winning novel that follows twelve characters from Native communities: all traveling to the Big Oakland Powwow, all connected to one another in ways they may not yet realize. Fierce, funny, suspenseful, and impossible to put down--full of poetry and rage, exploding onto the page with urgency and force. There There is at once poignant and unflinching, utterly contemporary and truly unforgettable.
- Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer
As a botanist and professor of plant ecology, Robin Wall Kimmerer has spent a career learning how to ask questions of nature using the tools of science. As a Potawatomi woman, she learned from elders, family, and history that the Potawatomi, as well as a majority of other cultures indigenous to this land, consider plants and animals to be our oldest teachers. Kimmerer brings these two lenses of knowing together to reveal what it means to see humans as "the younger brothers of creation".
- An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
Today in the United States, there are more than five hundred federally recognized Indigenous nations comprising nearly three million people, descendants of the fifteen million Native people who once inhabited this land. The centuries-long genocidal program of the US settler-colonial regimen has largely been omitted from history. Now, for the first time, acclaimed historian and activist Roxanne Dunbar-Ortizoffers a history of the United States told from the perspective of Indigenous peoples and reveals how Native Americans, for centuries, actively resisted expansion of the US empire.
- The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee by David Treuer
Growing up Ojibwe on a reservation in Minnesota, training as an anthropologist, and researching Native life past and present for his nonfiction and novels, David Treuer has uncovered a different narrative from the received idea of Native American history: that American Indian history essentially ended with the 1890 massacre at Wounded Knee. Because they did not disappear—and not despite but rather because of their intense struggles to preserve their language, their traditions, their families, and their very existence—the story of American Indians since the end of the nineteenth century to the present is one of unprecedented resourcefulness and reinvention.
All titles are available through the Michael Schwartz Library, OhioLINK, and Cleveland Public Library partnerships.
WATCH & LEARN
Through Kanopy, CSU students, faculty, and staff can stream award-winning films such as:
- Tarahumara: Festival of The Easter Moon (2005)
Shot in 1976, but never released, this film is a rare visual document of the Tarahumara - one of the most remote and isolated tribes of the North American continent. Filmed during a gathering at the mission village of Norogachic of northwest Mexico, the nomadic Tarahumara are observed celebrating their special interpretation of the Easter Festival. The week-long gathering uniquely explores both Christian and pre-Christian expressions of honoring the Easter Moon, the time when traditionally the Tarahumara dance, plant corn and drink Tesvino, the corn wine that blesses nearly every Tarahumara occasion from birth to death. - Unnatural Causes: Bad Sugar (2008)
What happened to the health of the Pima? BAD SUGAR explores this topic.
The Pima and Tohono O’odham Indians of southern Arizona have arguably the highest diabetes rates in the world – half of all adults are afflicted. But a century ago, diabetes was virtually unknown here. Researchers have poked and prodded the Pima for decades in search of a biological – or more recently, genetic – explanation for their high rates of disease. Meanwhile, medical-only interventions have failed to stem the rising tide not just among Native Americans, but globally. - Rhymes for Young Ghouls (2014)
Red Crow Mi'gMaq reservation, 1976: By government decree, every Indian child under the age of 16 must attend residential school. In the kingdom of the Crow, that means imprisonment at St. Dymphna’s, where students are under the mercy of "Popper," the sadistic agent who runs the school. At 15, Aila is the weed princess of Red Crow. Hustling with her uncle Burner, she sells enough dope to pay Popper her “truancy tax”, keeping her out of St.Ds. But when Aila's drug money is stolen and her father Joseph returns from prison, the precarious balance of Aila’s world is destroyed. Her only options are to run or fight… and Mi'gMaq don't run.
These stories highlight the creativity, resilience, and cultural impact of Indigenous artists and communities.
KEEP THE CONVERSATION GOING
Native American Heritage Month is more than a commemoration — it’s an invitation to continue learning and listening all year long. The Michael Schwartz Library remains dedicated to providing resources that honor diversity, promote understanding, and connect our campus community through shared discovery.
💚 You Belong Here — at the Michael Schwartz Library. 💚