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Renowned ballet dancer Jock Soto (Diné/Puerto Rican) is being celebrated by the International Museum of Dance for his career that started when he was hand-selected at age 16 by New York City Ballet founder George Balanchine as a principal dancer. He went on to an acclaimed career on stage and as a mentor to up-and-coming dancers. We’ll talk with Soto about his dancing and choreography career.

Composer Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate’s (Chickasaw) new compositions are based on his tribe’s clan animals, including woodpeckers, deer, and racoons. They’re included on a new album, “Woodland Songs,” by the Dover Quartet. The album also includes songs by singer-songwriter Pura Fé (Tuscarora and Taino) that Tate arranged for the ensemble. We’ll talk with Tate about his interpreting the mix of traditional Native ideas in a classical music setting.

 

Break 1 Music: V. Shawi’ [Raccoon] (song) Dover Quartet (artist) Woodland Songs (album)

Break 2 Music: Real Things (song) Joe H Henry (artist) Real Things (album)

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A relatively new program with proven results in improving the health of expecting and new mothers may be in jeopardy. Efforts to renew the Enhancing Reviews and Surveillance to Eliminate Maternal Mortality (ERASE MM) program by the September 30 deadline have so far been unsuccessful. ERASE MM panels review and document social and legal factors that go into providing maternal health care. Absent or inconsistent approaches state-by-state could make it harder to spot gaps for Native mothers.

Federal funding cuts also threaten access to birth control for more than 800,000 women. The Trump administration is signaling a shift in the Nixon-era program known as Title X, promoting fertility programs for low-income women rather than providing them contraception. In addition, pending cuts to Medicaid could reduce family planning services to millions more. We’ll take a look at the current trend in family planning services for Native Americans.

GUESTS

Camie Goldhammer (Sisseton Wahpeton), founding executive director of Hummingbird Indigenous Family Services

MichaeLynn Kanichy (member of the Makah Tribe), co-founder of The Hi•dubał Baʔas

Julia Wall (Pueblo and Anishinaabe), health administrator for the Changing Woman Initiative

Shireen Ghorbani, president and CEO for the Planned Parenthood Association of Utah

 

Break 1 Music: Women’s Honoring Song (song) Red Hawk Medicine Drum (artist) New Beginnings (album)

Break 2 Music: Real Things (song) Joe H Henry (artist) Real Things (album)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 56:13 — 38.6MB) | Embed

Since the technology was first made publicly available in the U.S. more than a century ago, radio has endured repeated predictions of its demise. Even with the explosion of digital streaming and on-demand podcasts, the nation’s top ratings firm finds at least 82% of Americans listen to traditional, terrestrial radio each week. We’ll mark National Radio Day by talking to Native people who have a passion for the medium, including the host of the longest-running Native radio show in Texas, a radio reporter who covers Indigenous affairs in Oklahoma, and an Alaska teenager who built his own internet radio station in his bedroom.

GUESTS

Sarah Liese (Turtle Mountain Chippewa and Diné), Indigenous Affairs reporter at KOSU

Albert Old Crow (Southern Cheyenne), Cheyenne and Arapaho tribal council coordinator and host of “Beyond Bows and Arrows”

 Colton Prince (Athabascan and Iñupiaq), owner of 98.5 Music Alaska

Bob Petersen (Yup’ik), network manager for Native Voice One (NV1)

U.S. Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD)

Listen to an extended interview NAC producer Sol Traverso did with Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD) about securing funding for 35 tribal radio stations before the passing of the recent rescission package:

 

Break 1 Music: Trick Song (song) Battle River (artist) Hard Times (album)

Break 2 Music: Real Things (song) Joe H Henry (artist) Real Things (album)

Full disclosure: Native Voice One is the distribution division of Koahnic Broadcasting Corporation, Native America Calling’s parent organization.

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Among the big wins in athletic competition this summer is the victory by the Haudenosaunee Nationals at the Pan-American Women’s Lacrosse Championship. They are first time medalists at the senior level and their win over Puerto Rico has far-reaching implications. We’ll hear from a player and a coach for the team and take the opportunity to catch up with some other notable Native athletes, from a Comanche professional boxer to the Diné college swimmer.

GUESTS

Carli Upton (Chickasaw and Choctaw), student and golfer at Tishomingo High School

Bean Minerd (Onondaga Nation), Haudenosaunee Nationals women’s lacrosse team member and head women’s lacrosse coach of Buffalo State University

George “Comanche Boy” Tahdooahnippah (Comanche), former professional boxer, North American Indigenous Athletics Hall of Fame inductee, and CEO of Numunu

Kaylah Yazzie (Navajo, Comanche, and Sac and Fox), swimmer for the University of New Mexico

Claudia Jimerson (Cayuga Nation), director of lacrosse operations and board member for the Haudenosaunee Nationals

 

Break 1 Music: Different Build (song) Nige B (artist) Reshape – Refashion (album)

Break 2 Music: Real Things (song) Joe H Henry (artist) Real Things (album)

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News consumers have a constant stream of information at their fingertips, but how reliable is it and how do people check the facts? Indigenous journalists are a means to bring balanced viewpoints to newsrooms that typically have limited interaction with Indigenous populations. As the annual gathering of the Indigenous Journalists Association gets underway in Albuquerque, N.M., we’ll discuss how journalism is changing and how Indigenous journalists are responding to new pressures for transparency, fact-checking, and bias.

GUESTS

Angel Ellis (Muscogee), director of Mvskoke Media and on board of directors for Indigenous Journalists Association and Oklahoma Media Center

Shaun Griswold (Laguna, Jemez and Zuni Pueblo), correspondent at High Country News and Native News Online

Nancy Marie Spears (Cherokee), Indigenous Children and Families Reporter for The Imprint

Hattie Kauffman (Nez Perce), journalist and first Native American to file a report on a national news broadcast

 

Break 1 Music: On the Road Missing Home (Corn Dance) (song) Sheldon Sundown (artist) Hand Drum/Smoke N’ Round Dance (album)

Break 2 Music: The Gift of Life (song) Randy Wood (artist) The Gift of Life (album)

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The summer of 1945 saw three nuclear explosions that ushered in a new era of experimentation, development, and fear when it comes to the potential for such a powerful weapon. Native people are among those suffering the most from the consequences of that path. The first test of the atomic bomb at the Trinity site in New Mexico, and the subsequent use of the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, signaled the U.S. Government’s new push to develop nuclear weapons, fueled by millions of tons of uranium ore mined near Native land in New Mexico and Arizona. And ongoing nuclear tests exposed thousands of Native people in the Southwest and in Alaska to dangerous levels of radiation. We’ll explore the ongoing effects on Native people of nuclear weapons and power development, in this encore presentation.

GUESTS

Marissa Naranjo (Santa Clara Pueblo), deputy director of Sovereign Energy and board member for Honor Our Pueblo Existence (HOPE)

Loretta Anderson (Laguna Pueblo), co-sponsor of the Southwest Uranium Miners Coalition Post-71

Tina Cordova, co-founder and executive director of the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium

 

Break 1 Music: Atomic (song) Sunburnt Stone (artist) El Navaho (album)

Break 2 Music: I Am the Beginning and the End (song) Dorothy Tsatoke (artist) Native American Healing Songs Come to me Great Mystery (album)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 56:01 — 38.5MB) | Embed

Another year and another record revenue report for the tribal gaming industry. The annual report by the National Indian Gaming Commission finds slot machines, table games, sports betting, and other enterprises reaped $43.9 billion in 2024. That’s up more than $2 billion from the previous year. But there are potential setbacks on the horizon that could affect gaming, including flagging consumer confidence, confusing foreign trade policies, and federal government’s diminished regard for tribal sovereignty. We’ll get a status update and a look ahead for tribal gaming.

GUESTS

Ernie Stevens Jr. (Oneida Nation of Wisconsin), chairman of the National Indian Gaming Association

Derrick Beetso (Navajo), professor of practice and executive director of Indian Gaming and Self-Governance at Arizona State University

 

Break 1 Music: Happy Sundance (song) Dallas Arcand (artist) Modern Day Warrior (album)

Break 2 Music: The Gift of Life (song) Randy Wood (artist) The Gift of Life (album)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 55:36 — 38.2MB) | Embed

Hopes to fix the Santee Sioux Nation’s lack of clean drinking water faded as federal funding for a pipeline project is increasingly tangled in government turmoil. Tribal citizens are forced to drink bottled water to avoid the high levels of manganese in well water. On the Navajo Nation, dozens of people’s water wells are contaminated with chemicals, like benzene, associated with the oil and gas drilling industry. There are many mysterious, uncapped wells that could be contributing to the problem. They are just two of the problems tribal citizens are having when it comes to accessing the most basic resource.

GUESTS

Heather Tanana (Diné), initiative lead of the Universal Access to Clean Water for Tribal Communities and law professor at the University of Denver

Nicole Horseherder (Navajo), executive director of Tó Nizhóní Ání

Kameron Runnels (Santee Sioux), vice chairman of the Santee Sioux Nation

Jerry Redfern, staff reporter for Capital & Main

 

Break 1 Music: The Four Essential Elements [Diigo Bee’iináanii] (song) Radmilla Cody (artist) K’é Hasin (album)

Break 2 Music: The Gift of Life (song) Randy Wood (artist) The Gift of Life (album)