Member Education Sessions: Indigenous Food Sovereignty

Whitney Sawney, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation, is the Director of Communications and Policy for the Native American Agriculture Fund (NAAF), the largest philanthropic organization devoted solely to serving Native American farmers and ranchers and advancing agriculture throughout Tribal communities. Whitney is a graduate of the University of Arkansas and has seven years of experience working in policy communications throughout Indian Country. Before joining NAAF, Whitney worked at the National Congress of American Indians and the Indigenous Food and Agriculture Initiative, where her work focused on promoting Tribal food sovereignty and agriculture policy research.  

Natalie Benally is a dance artist, filmmaker, writer, actress, and community/language advocate from the Navajo Nation. She has directed and choreographed numerous theater productions. Likewise, Benally has also become involved in film and television productions, both as crew and in creative direction. She is the Co-Founder & Creative Director of Tse’Nato’, a mixed-media storytelling company to amplify Indigenous voices and representation. She is the recipient of the Senator John Pinto Native American Filmmakers Fund Grant and the First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellowship. Of note, Benally has performed the lead role of Dory in the Navajo dubbed version of Disney/Pixar’s Finding Nemo.  Natalie is also the executive producer for the film, Indigenize the Plate, in which she travels from New Mexico to a Quechua community in Peru to learn how they are addressing the link between food sustainability and cultural sustainability for Indigenous communities.   About the Film Indigenize the Plate:   As extraction, water displacement, and climate change impact food sustainability in indigenous communities, this is having a direct impact on cultural sustainability.  A Diné woman travels from the Navajo Nation to a Quechuan community in Peru that has developed a way to address this challenge in their own region.  The Santa Cruz Lodge is a community-owned hospitality space that doubles as a cultural resource center. The business-side supports the cultivation, preparation, and serving of traditional cuisine as well as being made available as a space for ceremonial practices. In the end, the weary traveler from the heart of New Mexico finds parallels between her peoples and the Quechuans and is inspired to return home with the wisdom and knowledge she has gained from the journey.