Keynote
Ernestine Hayes
Ernestine Hayes belongs to the Kaagwaantaan clan of the Tlingit nation. Recipient of a Rasmuson Distinguished Artist Award (2021), United States Artists Fellowship (2023), Luce Indigenous Knowledge Fellowship (2024), and Alaska Writer Laureate 2016-2018, Hayes’ works include Blonde Indian, an Alaska Native Memoir, The Tao of Raven, essays and poetry in Studies in American Indian Literature, Yellow Medicine Review, Wicazo Sa Review, and Waterstone Review, as well as other journals and anthologies.
She has been invited speaker at events for Native Arts and Culture Foundation, Power and Privilege Symposium, Alaska Can! Education Conference, Princeton University Museum Symposium, Native Movement JustTransition, Indigepalooza, and other venues.
University of Alaska professor emerita, Hayes makes her home in Juneau not far from the Juneau Indian Village where she was born.