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 Gender-Based Violence and American Indian and Alaska Native Communities

November 8, 2022
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Objectives:

To understand the scope and profile of missing Native American persons in Nebraska
	Understand How Settler Colonial Historical Oppression Has Imposed and Perpetuated Structural
	Violence Against Indigenous Peoples
	Identify Culturally Relevant Promotive and Protective Factors
	Provide an Example of Indigenist Research That is Promotive Against Historical Oppression
	Understand How All Are Accountable for Dismantling the Internalized Colonial Mindset
	Prevent Complicity is Perpetuating Settler Colonial Historical Oppression Institutionally,
	Interpersonally, and Internally
	Describe the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey
	Interpret estimates of violence against American Indian and Alaska Native women and men
	Identify implications for policy and practice
  
  
          Transcript
Hello,

Continuing Education: Hello, everyone! Thank you for joining us. We're gonna give everyone a moment to settle in, and we will start shortly at two o'clock. But while we are waiting for everyone to join us, if you wouldn't mind um in the chat box, letting us know where you're from, so um,

Continuing Education: if you could please share

Continuing Education: um your name, your agency, your role, and where you're joining us from?

Continuing Education: All right, Welcome, everyone from joining us It is one fifty-nine. So i'm gonna go ahead and at least start some of the housekeeping uh information just because I want us to maximize the um the time our presenters have. Um. We're really looking forward to today's presentation. So thank you for joining us. Um! So a few things

Continuing Education: to um

Continuing Education: remind you about. So welcome to the gender based violence and American Indian Alaska native communities. Webinar. Um. So to make most out of today's event, please make sure you use your airbus, your earphones. Um and have stable Internet connection.

Continuing Education: Um, If you're having any technical difficulties, you could always try to log on and log back off using that link that you used. Um.

Continuing Education: If not, you can always send me um a direct message, and I can see if I can provide any support. You can also email us

Continuing Education: at Cpe, at Ssw. You, Maryland, Ed, You and I'll have that information in the the chat box, so you can. If you have any technical issues. You can always email us or give us a call. Um,

Continuing Education: please. During today's Webinar. Please use the chat box feature that is, on the to the toolbar at the bottom. It's the little bubble, it says, Q. And A. So please use um the Q. And A. Box to ask any questions for our presenters,

Continuing Education: the slides and the recordings will be posted in the next upcoming week. So please um look out for that email to let you know when that you'll have access to the recording of this Webinar

Continuing Education: we just want. We have a few acknowledgments: Um. Rutgers School of Soul for work, the violence against Women's Research Consortium Um, The National Institute of Justice in I. A. In Ij. Excuse me, and the University of Maryland School Social work. Um. So this virtual brown bag is supported in part by the award number

Continuing Education: two thousand and sixteen Mu. C. X K. Zero, one one awarded by the National Institute of Justice,

Continuing Education: um, and just a disclaimer. Any opinions or points, if you's expressed in this presentation are those of the presenters, and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the Us. Department of Justice. Um. And with that information I'm. Going to introduce

Continuing Education: and Nancy Levine. She is the Director of the National Institute of justice. Welcome, Nancy!

Nancy La Vigne: Thank you so much. Uh: good afternoon, Everyone or good morning for those of you on on the west coast. It's my pleasure to be joining you today uh to help launch this webinar and observance of the National American Heritage Month Native American Heritage month. Um.

Nancy La Vigne: Now we know that this month is a time when we honor that native American heritage. But we also know that one a month is not enough.

Nancy La Vigne: We should really honor every day, because it's the very fabric of our nation, and has been an integral part of Nij's tribal Crime and Justice research both generally and specifically, for violence against American, Indian and Alaska native women program of research. And we're very

Nancy La Vigne: appreciative and really delighted to partner with the violence against Women Research Consortium to share with you today what we know about the strength and real resiliency of tribal communities in the face of substantial question of violence and a victimization.

Nancy La Vigne: Uh, now,

Nancy La Vigne: um! I have joined Nij as its director. I started in May of this year, but it's not my first time at Nij. I was actually working here at the Institute back in the nineteen Ninety S. I know that dates me a bit. Um, but of course I was working in a very different role, and as much as that role was different. Some things have not changed, and one is the amazing work that this Institute supports, and the exceptional staff,

Nancy La Vigne: and I've particularly been impressed with Nij's violence against women and family violence, research and evaluation

Nancy La Vigne: program, which is managed by Christine Crossland. She goes by Tina. Many of you know her, and she has developed her violence against American, Indian and Alaska native women program of research. Um! She is dedicated. She is committed. She digs deep.

Nancy La Vigne: She wants to get it right. She knows the value of research, and she's been an amazing leader in this field. She has brought so much knowledge and expertise to this work, and she alone is a major reason why we've made substantial tribes, starts and understanding,

Nancy La Vigne: preventing an intervening and violence against indigenous women.

Nancy La Vigne: Uh, but we have much more work to do, and I'm I'm well aware of that. Um. This is certainly a priority issue for me as a research topic. I also have priorities as a director that span research topics. So they're more about the nature of the research process,

Nancy La Vigne: and one of my key priorities is what i'm calling inclusive research, and that's making sure that no matter the topic, no matter the methodology, whether it's solely qualitative or silly, quantitative or mixed methods that it's vitally important that we make sure that we engage with the people that are closest to the issue problem being studied,

Nancy La Vigne: and that and relatedly, Another priority of mine is what i'm calling approaching the research through an equity lens um, and that one is so important when you think about the criminal justice system and the history um

Nancy La Vigne: of our country in the context of the justice system and the deeply rooted uh disparities, inequalities, discrimination, bias, racism,

Nancy La Vigne: et cetera, like we cannot disentangle that history, and those factors that continue on today from the nature of the research, you know, engage in, and and i'm not just talking about research that's specifically looking at disparities by race or or efficiency, or gender, um, or or or any of those other important um identity factors. Um, that's important. We funded such work, and we'll continue to fund that work.

Nancy La Vigne: But I would argue that every research topic in our space requires that type of an equity lens.

Nancy La Vigne: I i'm really pleased to share that, even though these are my priorities as Nij's new director. Um, they've been um followed, and by Staff uh Tina, and many others, especially

Nancy La Vigne: in terms of Nij's tribal crime and justice research. Um, in in particular, the the Cru, Our tribal crime and justice research is,

Nancy La Vigne: and has been

Nancy La Vigne: collaborative and participatory uh the type of research that we sponsor and and engage in, and that is as to understand criminal and juvenile justice problems and American, Indian and Alaska native communities is really

Nancy La Vigne: embedded in this notion that we need to involve the people affected by these issues in the design and the implementation and the collection, the analysis of data. And of course, in the interpretation of research findings.

Nancy La Vigne: So this type of collaborative participatory process helps ensure that research and evaluation is um sensitive to tribal culture. Um, The world views um, and the differences in diversity of tribes and cultures and languages. And it also ensures that research methods, respect, travel, sovereignty, customs, and traditions. So i'm very delighted to know that in addition to our violence against women research, solicitation, we also plan

Nancy La Vigne: to release our tribal research capacity building grant solicitation in this fiscal year. So keep an eye out on that. Unfortunately that the solicitation uh was not released last year, but i'm happy to know that it will be released. Um this year, and very proud of that.

Nancy La Vigne: So thank you again for taking the time to join us for this Webinar, and thanks to the researchers who will be sharing their knowledge, which is so important and impactful. Thanks for all that all of you do to promote safer communities and more technical justice systems. Thank you.

Continuing Education: Thank you for that lovely opening remark. And now i'm a I'm going to be able to introduce Dr. Katie Schultz. She is a ph. She and Msw. And a citizen of the Choctaw nation of Oklahoma, and she is also an assistant professor of social work at the University of Michigan

Continuing Education: Mit. Ctl. And her research focuses primarily on responding to violence and associated outcomes in understanding community and cultural connectedness in American, Indian and Alaska native communities. One

Continuing Education: current studies include one focused on risk and protective factors related to justice, involvement among a native population, and another investigating social networks and associations with substance, use violence and suicide amounts.

Continuing Education: Um, American Indian adolescents,

Continuing Education: Dr. Schultz. Thank you and take it away

Katie Schultz: All right. Thank you for that introduction. Thank you for the opportunity to facilitate this. A very important conversation today. Um, i'm going to give a little bit of background on the consortium and the objectives today, and then jump right into the presentation. That's who we are here to hear from

Katie Schultz: uh the violence against Women's Research Consortium is a collaborative project with the center for research on ending violence at Rutgers University of Maryland School of Social Work and the National Institute of justice. The focus of the consortium is to identify gaps in research and practice in the areas of intimate partner violence,

Katie Schultz: sexual violence, stocking and team dating violence. Another goal is to implement research and evaluation projects, to fill gaps in our current knowledge, in the field of gender based violence. A final goal is to disseminate research to wide to a wide range of audiences.

Katie Schultz: Objectives for today are related to gender based violence, American being Alaska native communities. We've got a tall order for our panelists. Uh, we will be talking about how to better understand the scope and profile of missing native American persons in Nebraska.

Katie Schultz: Understanding how settler. Colonial historical oppression has imposed and perpetrated. Structural violence against indigenous peoples

Katie Schultz: identify culturally relevant, promotive, and protective factors.

Katie Schultz: Provide an example of indigenous research that is promotive against historical oppression.

Katie Schultz: Understand how all are accountable for dismantling internalized colonial mindset,

Katie Schultz: prevent complicity and perpetrating settler colonial, historical oppression Institutionally interpersonally and internally

Katie Schultz: We will also give descriptions from the national intimate partner and sexual violence. Survey interpret estimates of violence against American, Indian and Alaska, native women and men, and identify implications for a policy and practice one hundred and fifty.

Katie Schultz: So, as I said, uh, quite a tall order for the panelists who are about to uh come after. I do this next brief enter uh. We'll have three presentations today,

Katie Schultz: so the first will focus primarily on missing persons, native Peoples and Nebraska. I'm. Going to give a brief introduction to our three presenters, and then I will turn it over to them to take it away.

Katie Schultz: The first of our three is Dr. Emily Wright, Uh. Dr. Wright is an assistant Vice Chancellor for research and creative activity, and professor in the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Nebraska, Omaha.

Katie Schultz: She is also a member of the Cherokee Nation, and serves on the Us. Department of Justice Task Force on Research on Violence against American Indian and Alaska native women. Her research focuses on violence against women and children, particularly those in marginalized populations.

Katie Schultz: Welcome, doctor, Right

Katie Schultz: uh our next presenter in this Pan On this next presentation is Dr. Tara Richards.

Katie Schultz: Dr. Richards is a distinguished associate professor in the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Nebraska, Omaha, and a faculty lead for Unos Victimology and victim studies. Research Lab.

Katie Schultz: Her research focuses on prevention, Intervention and system Response to sexual assault, intimate partner violence, child abuse, neglect,

Katie Schultz: and finally, last, but certainly not least, uh Sheena Gilbert is joining us. Sheena is a Phd student in the school of criminology and criminal justice at the University of Nebraska, Omaha, and a citizen of the Stockbridge Munsey tribe

Katie Schultz: shout out, Got a lot of good friends there. We'll have to play. Who do we now afterwards Um. Her research focuses on victimization and underserved populations, indigenous crime and victimization and policy reform and campus sexual victimization.

Katie Schultz: So with that i'm very excited to hear what our presenters have to say, and I will turn it over to you.

Emily Wright: Thank you. Thank you. So as with our tech uh check in

Emily Wright: my powerpoint. Still doesn't work. So okay, give me a second.

Emily Wright: It's always something.

Emily Wright: It's not really a zoom meeting with a presentation. If it Doesn't work

Emily Wright: is kind of the way I feel.

Emily Wright: Here we go,

Emily Wright: all right, Sheena. I'm gonna let you start us off,

Emily Wright: and

Emily Wright: then I will take it at the methods

Sheena Gilbert: sounds good. So, as Dr. Schultz said, Um, our present, our presentation today is looking at missing or murdered indigenous persons in uh Nebraska.

Sheena Gilbert: Oh, go ahead next.

Sheena Gilbert: So this research, um

Sheena Gilbert: uh! In this presentation was sponsored by the National Institute of Justice under the Niger Grant, number two thousand nineteen, seventy-five, Dx. Zero, one four. Therefore the conclusions expressed in this presentation are those of the presenters and don't necessarily reflect the views of the National Institute of justice.

Sheena Gilbert: And we also believe that without the funding from Nij we're pretty certain that this work uh would not have been done.

That's

Sheena Gilbert: so. When it comes to missing this and the disparities the native American communities. There are some things that we have to consider. First, there are some social disparities and experiences with violence that may contribute to the environment where individuals, either intentionally or unintentionally go missing. So um

Sheena Gilbert: in native communities it is not in common that they suffer the social disparities would be like poverty. Um, isolation, low educational attainment, high unemployment rates uh substance abuse. So we need to consider that context when we think about missing this in among this population

Sheena Gilbert: also, we need to consider that native Americans have been subjected to genocide colonization and racism since the countries in inception. Um Specifically, when it comes to colonization. We need to think about

Sheena Gilbert: um forcefully being removed from their communities, and they located on what we now call reservations um for assimilation Specifically, when children were sent to boarding schools. So again, we need to consider that um contacts when we think about missing this, and then um basically at any study.

Sheena Gilbert: Um in this population, specifically for this uh research uh native American missing persons, it needs to be understood within that historical context. And how these ongoing structural inequalities and disparities can make them more vulnerable to going missing.

Sheena Gilbert: Um again. Um! With this research there is it kind of like came out of this national attention to the problem of missing a murder. Native Americans. Um! In two thousand and nineteen there was the Federal task force that was created the operation like just um operation. Lady Justice

Sheena Gilbert: um! That kind of sparked this. And then, since then there have been states that have done efforts, whether it be through legislation task force to address this issue and um. So that's kind of how this project came about. Um. Here in Nebraska we had a legislative bill, one hundred and fifty-four

Sheena Gilbert: that was um

Sheena Gilbert: seeking to address this issue here in this state.

Sheena Gilbert: Um, and then also we need to think about measuring again. Population is inherently difficult, especially um This population, as we know, there's a lack of data in general when it comes to anything indigenous. Um! And then, when you think about kind of missing persons

Sheena Gilbert: Um, sometimes you don't even know they're missing until maybe they've been found. Um, You also need to think about the intentional

Sheena Gilbert: um going missing like a victim, escaping abuse and meeting ticket away for the unintentional, whether that be like crime related like human trafficking or um homicide. So when it comes to this population, we need to think about those kind of

Sheena Gilbert: issues when it comes to really understanding the scope of missing persons. So with that Um,

Sheena Gilbert: the entire project we start to understand like, how big is the problem in Nebraska? And can we reliably measure missing native persons? What are some barriers to recording, investigating, and solving these cases, and then um providing recommendations.

Sheena Gilbert: But for today's presentation we're just going to focus on that first point of how big is the problem here in Nebraska, and then can we reliably measure missing native persons?

Sheena Gilbert: Uh, So with that I will turn it over to Dr: Right.

Emily Wright: Thank you. Thank you, Sheena. Okay. So we just need to jump right into it because we don't have a ton of time. We're gonna talk about the methodology. What did we do? How did we do it? And then um focus just on the findings with regard to the quantitative data.

Emily Wright: So First and foremost, we have to understand missing persons. Um, really as a point in time, time, count.

Emily Wright: So that's because missing person cases are very dynamic. A person can be reported as missing one day, and then found taken off of a missing person's list,

Emily Wright: you know. Three days later, three months later they can go back on to the list at any given time as well. So we need to understand that the number of missing persons, as well as who's actually missing is going to change depending on when you draw the data

Emily Wright: when you collect the data. So again, our data are really should be understood as point in time counts um of the missing persons cases at the days and the times that we drew the data. So um, we ended up. We wanted to get

Emily Wright: a little bit of a look at multiple time points. Um for missing persons cases in Nebraska. So we ended up pulling data from missing persons lists. Uh at four points

Emily Wright: during the year, two thousand and twenty, which will always go down in history as a remarkable year. Um, because of Covid. So uh, we did pull we did collect both quantitative and qualitative data.

Emily Wright: Um, Again, i'm going to focus on the quantitative data in this presentation.

Emily Wright: Um, our data lists that we pulled um names of missing persons from came from three missing persons. List. One was the Nebraska Missing Persons List, the State List.

Emily Wright: Another one was Nameus, the National Missing, and an identified Person's list. And then there was Nick Mick, the National Center for Missing, and it exploited Children's Missing Persons list, and again. We collected um these names at four points in time. In January, March,

Emily Wright: June, and October of two thousand and twenty.

Emily Wright: Obviously the lockdowns for Covid did occur right around March twenty, twenty. We did see a little bit of a dip in the data,

Emily Wright: as you'll see in just a minute.

Emily Wright: We did uh we wanted to supplement the um quantitative data with qualitative data. I'm not going to talk about the qualitative data here, but I do want everybody to know that we did take significant efforts to um

Emily Wright: Here voices from multiple people around the issue of missing and murdered native um Nebraskans. So we did, listening sessions with tribal communities in Nebraska. We took um notes from the themes that came up

Emily Wright: in all of these um and all of our qualitative data. We we asked the participants. What is it,

Emily Wright: You know that that um

Emily Wright: our potential barriers to reporting native uh missing person cases

Emily Wright: and investigating them generally, And then, as they pertain specifically to native Americans in Nebraska. Um. We also asked um law enforcement departments across the State to provide us with their missing person's policies, and we did sort of a thematic analysis of those.

Emily Wright: And then we capped off the qualitative data by conducting interviews with victim service providers and law enforcement personnel

Emily Wright: across the State. Some might have been tribal, affiliated, others might have um just worked with tribal um communities or been adjacent to them at some point.

Emily Wright: Um,

Emily Wright: so to get straight to the quantitative findings

Emily Wright: about the scope of missing persons in the Nebraska, especially as they pertain to native Americans. Um. And what sort of characteristics. These cases looked like.

Emily Wright: We first looked at Um the rate of missing persons across Nebraska as a whole, and then we looked at various um racial categories.

Emily Wright: So the the Nebraska missing person's rate was fairly stable across all of our four points in time. It was around uh about three people. Per ten thousand Nebraskans would have been uh missing at any at those time points.

Emily Wright: Um! Then we looked at the missing person rate among the various racial categories that we could look at. And um! That's where we started to find some disparities. So we find that missing

Emily Wright: per the missing persons rate among native Americans in Nebraska was the second highest um across all four points in time in any of the racial categories it was only second highest. Um!

Emily Wright: It was only uh slightly lower than the missing person's rate for African Americans in Nebraska. So, for instance, at time one per um ten thousand persons in Nebraska, we would find that about thirteen

Emily Wright: would be um reported as missing, and they were native American compared to Uh African American missing persons. Um,

Emily Wright: in Nebraska would would have been about fourteen, and and um! You can see that the numbers are fairly stable again at time. Two. That's march thirty, first of twenty, twenty. We do see a dip across everybody. Um, mostly because of. We think the Covid uh lockdowns could take in place

Emily Wright: right right before. Then.

Emily Wright: Another way to look at this data is to compare Um the racial makeup of Nebraska's population to the racial makeup of Nebraska's missing persons population. So

Emily Wright: if you expect parity or proportionality um in uh the racial distribution of native May or uh missing persons in Nebraska. You would expect

Emily Wright: the red lines here and the um gray lines to be approximately equal for each racial category. Okay, So for instance, we see

Emily Wright: um that eighty-eight percent of Nebraska's population is white.

Emily Wright: Okay? But we see that only sixty-seven of Nebraska's missing persons population is white right? So they're under represented um among native um of um among missing persons

Emily Wright: compared to what you would expect given their racial makeup in the State. Now, when you look at black and native American um American groups, that's where you see the numbers are flipped. So, for instance, Um,

Emily Wright: The Nebraska population has about five percent African Americans,

Emily Wright: and yet they make up almost twenty of the of the Nebraska missing persons population. So Here you see that they are over represented by about four times what you would expect their pop, their numbers to be given,

Emily Wright: their representation in the Nebraska population, the same thing, or very similar. Is there a question of three minutes? Sorry. Okay. Okay. So the same thing is, um is true for native Americans. They make up about one and a half of the Nebraska population,

Emily Wright: but uh, four and a half of the Nebraska native American, I mean, uh missing persons population, and that's about three times their

Emily Wright: their population that you would expect from the State um a couple of other things about the profile of um native American missing persons cases the majority were um minor boys. We expected this to be girls and women. We did not find that

Emily Wright: um at each time point uh the majority of native American missing persons were uh minor boys.

Emily Wright: Almost ten percent of the native American missing persons. Cases were repeatedly missing,

Emily Wright: so they were identified as missing. They came off the list at some point. They went back on the list, and Dr. Richards could talk about that more during the Q. A session if you would like.

Emily Wright: Uh. We also wanted to see what um missing persons list was the most comprehensive and reliable, and we found that um the Nebraska Missing Persons list uh had the most names, and Um was probably the most accurate of all three of the missing persons list that we checked.

Emily Wright: Uh. We also wanted to see if any of the missing persons cases the native missing person's cases

Emily Wright: were associated with any violent or nonviolent crime in the State of Nebraska, and we did not find any overlap between native American missing persons cases and um law enforcement cases.

Emily Wright: Um. I will leave this up for just a second and just say we wanted to capture tribal members perspectives on what could be barriers to reporting and investigating missing persons cases.

Emily Wright: We found a lot of potential barriers from their perspectives, things like system, systemic issues of poverty and isolation, domestic violence and things like that. They had a lot of questions about who to report to, when to report a missing case where they should go, how they should do it. So I think there's a knowledge gap there,

Emily Wright: and then I think another main take away from our study was that they actually perceived, and we shouldn't be surprised by this. But, um! They perceived that there could be possible negative consequences for involving the system,

Emily Wright: i. E. Reporting anyone uh as missing to police officers or any other representatives of the State, because they were afraid that in response they might have negative consequences like

Emily Wright: um, protective services would come in and take their babies away. So um,

Emily Wright: we uh, we have a lot more to talk about. We have. We can answer and address questions. Um in the Q. A. But we hope to um

Emily Wright: use the methodology that we have used in Nebraska, and move forward, working with New Mexico their department of Indian affairs, to essentially replicate this study in Nebraska, and see what kinds of patterns we uncover there.

Emily Wright: Thank you all so much.

Katie Schultz: Thank you for that. Um! Fifteen minutes sure goes quickly. Doesn't it.

Katie Schultz: I have a lot of questions. I hope other folks do. Uh, I will be watching the question and answer. We'll have time at the end for discussion. So for anyone in the audience who has questions. Please pop those in those in there as um as your questions arise.

Katie Schultz: Now we're gonna do our next lightning. Fifteen minute talk uh we're gonna hear from Dr. Mckinley. Dr. Mckinley is in a associate professor at the Tulane University School Social work. Her background has a very uh New Orleans. Vibe to me right now uh

Katie Schultz: her work focuses on families, health, equity, sex differences, women's, health, gender, violence, wellness, resilience, and transcendence. She works uh primarily with indigenous communities focused on historical oppression, mental and behavioral health violence and implications for clinical research.

Katie Schultz: Uh, Dr. Mckinley also specializes in working in community engaged research uh focusing on research that is culturally relevant and effective. Um, with a multi tiered and sustainable approach. I know she's going to talk more about that. So I will be quiet and let her take the lead.

Catherine McKinley: Thank you so much, Katie. Uh, that is, that is a big job, and you're doing amazing. So happy to be here with you all. Um, today. I'm going to be talking to you um about culturally relevant risk and protective factors related to violence and health. And what do you experience by indigenous people? Primarily you know violence, and how they're interrelated?

Catherine McKinley: Um for some. Let's say, uh you're cook here. Thank you um to uh Number one, the emissions people who's land unseated lands i'm at the honor to live upon them in the New Orleans area, Um, otherwise by the by the tuk to um it. Uh they do. Americans tribe as well as the Louisiana, Mississippi, and tribes, and also work with tribes in the Northwest, also want to acknowledge the funding sources. Primarily. Nih, who has been at this clinical trial up, report some results to you on as well as the pilot results,

Catherine McKinley: and I, although you only see me up here, I want to bring forward all of the incredible contributors who have built this program. Uh, i'll present results for, called the weeding of the Families Program, or Chaka Chafa Natana. This is a a program that prevents substance, abuse, and violence that has been built over about twelve years of research up committee based participatory research. And this is that we show that committee Advisory Board uh uh the person on the very right there. Dock or carol. Comey has passed away since we've started this project, and we dedicate

Catherine McKinley: the program to him because it really is a lot of the visions that he has had for the tribe intergenerationally, really. And so I just want to bring forward all of the uh, all the incredible people who have really given rise to the this program. Um happening.

Catherine McKinley: So today, uh i'm going to kind of step back a little bit less about book life uh way of thinking about this, to understand why. Why is systemic and structural violence happening at such a high rate in particular? Given that historically gender roles uh for indigenous women, and it uh

Catherine McKinley: in general. In general, we're much more expansive and egalitarian. So why now do we find that a lot of times, as you can see a lot of these health inequities. Why are they at a disproportionately high rate? And so that's kind of a broader question that's really thread through all of the work that I've done, but also to see how structures of self, settler colonization are really the conduit of oppression. And so, when there be violence, substance, abuse, um problems with the system systemic violence, bias it. It goes through the lens of settler colonial, historical oppression

Catherine McKinley: which have really changed the world use and the life ways of what's now known as Turtle Island, where we live today. So this is just kind of a a pictorial graphic of of what my journey has been like over the last twelve years. Again I mentioned.

Catherine McKinley: First of all, I I want to acknowledge my own positionality as a you know person of Sedler, Colonial background, Um, and and how and whether I should do this at all. And

Catherine McKinley: so that was the first study that I ever did was really to interview and work with indigenous and non indigenous researchers of, you know. Should I even look at this like what is my role? I don't want to perpetuate problems. I don't want to do more harm. Um, but it's such a important challenge, and there's so many beautiful strengths as well. So that first study was whether or how to do this, and I learned from researchers really some strategies for ethical and um pract practical kind of toolkit to set up studies in a good way, and they really kind of

Catherine McKinley: follow that. Um, you know, relational responsible research that other people have talked about as well. The Committee Base for participatory research, the long term engagement that getting invited. Allowing for a tribal perspective, you know, building infrastructure, a lot of these tools really have set up the rest of the work to to to turn out in a good way successfully, and also with tribal capacity building.

Catherine McKinley: And so the next study was, uh, really on

Catherine McKinley: listening to women's, stories of violence against women and the professionals that worked with them. So it was really about the system, and women's stories, and that led to the development of the framework of historical oppression, resilience, and transcendence so really situating structural violence in in kind of it's a cellar colonial framing, and how that that has changed and reversed a lot of gender roles and treatment, and how that really is a determinant for a lot of the mental physical health inequities we see today. And so, looking across the ecological levels of

Catherine McKinley: you know, community, family, individual risk and protective and promoted factors that are culturally relevant, relevant. And how this relates to more of a wellness approach in the medicine wheel, which is the holistic way that indigenous people, you know uh traditionally have viewed health Um, despite much variability across different nations.

Catherine McKinley: And so we developed that framework, as well as the historical oppression, scale, and the family resilience scale to measure whether you know these things be identified through about a thousand. You know um interviews and in focus groups, whether they protect kind of outcomes related to violence and substance abuse. And we found that they did.

Catherine McKinley: And then the the next study um that i'm gonna be sharing results with you about is, what are these risk and protective factors? And um! How do you infuse them in a a an intervention?

Catherine McKinley: And so that's kind of out present results for you about that today. And then, finally, the question really is, comes back as who and what is the intervention for right? If If a lot of the challenges are being introduced by structures of uh seller conversation that are in views, internalizing communities and institutions and families and people's. Minds.

Catherine McKinley: Then what what is the intervention for, and how we're all really um implicated um, and either perpetuating these structures, or or really redressing them. And how to do that? So I know these questions are really big, but I think it's fun. It's good to go kind of take a focalized look, but also kind of step back and understand why.

Catherine McKinley: So a lot of people think, you know. Maybe if you don't have indigenous background of the you know. Then why, what? How is it really relevant to to me, for instance?

Catherine McKinley: Well, the whole world has been colonized, and the same structure as a kind of missionaries, merchants, military oppression. They're patterns that you can see across the world. And they're really based on kind of a header patriarchy, federal, paternalistic idea of gender um. And if you go really back. It goes back to kind of the Roman Um uh, you know.

Catherine McKinley: Uh Christianity, Assimilation pro process is kind of where it came, and then you see it spread across the world, and I found out my own background is from Ireland, and I found out uh, actually, the British use the same. They practice those tools uh as an experiment on Ireland, and then they brought them to the Us. So if you do look into your own history, even if you have some European and or Uh African, because there's a tripartite model of African settlers to tell slaves that we're needed to do the labor.

Catherine McKinley: We're all connected. It's all connected, and therefore our all of our liberation and and experiences are are connected in the same way, and also oppressed. And so it really is relevant for all people in that.

Catherine McKinley: So, instead of having more of a dominant mindset, how can we kind of recenter indigenous world views where many ancestors have, you know, might have their own linkages if they could like locate them um, rather than kind of working for more of a perpetuating the same harm through a colonial mindset, and how how those things happen internalize without even knowing it.

Catherine McKinley: So I will go through all of these. But these are just some examples of how how really indigenous and and Western world views have class and how they were brought in. I'm. Just going to focus, especially on the family and relational level, since we're looking at violence.

Catherine McKinley: So with with Western settler colonialization really this again he had her own patriarchal, so more of a male run and hetero paternal, mail-read nuclear household really was brought in, and with the communities that I work with they were more matrilineal, natural, local people did different things. They were complementary, but they weren't hierarchical, so difference wasn't within a deficit. Difference was something. Sometimes people had special uh strengths, or were acknowledged um

Catherine McKinley: or more of a gender expansive, you know, worldview. Some tribes had three to five genders, you know, in terms of a two spirit and different different um roles. And uh uh roles in the different tribal communities. And so it was just a very different way of structuring in society,

Catherine McKinley: and with the entrance of, you know, seller. Conversations and violence, and the the views and the perceptions towards women really changed into egalitarian. A lot of gods and deities were women, and they were sacred to really dehumanizing and and have having more of an inferior input theory. Your approach to thinking about it just people in general, but also women and um gender minorities.

Catherine McKinley: And so when we think about this, you know, we we know that the the the history isn't equal right uh we're. We're on a colonized land. That means that

Catherine McKinley: the narrative that is told by the person people in power, right? And so these world views are not equally valued, and and this comes through in our research, protocols, paradigms, practices, and principles, and also our treatment, protocols, paradise principles and practices. And so to think about this more holistically, we need to step back and say, How can we redress not only the violence against women and children, but but the the the world views that perpetuate and drive them

Catherine McKinley: with these settler colonial tactics. So the kind of long term for future is how to balance, and also really uh lift up, use, use use, the the the power, and the resources that were built off the land that we live to really lift up those worldviews that many return to from the healing.

Catherine McKinley: So just to give you a few examples of some of these um tactics that were brought in with colonization that I found in this is that from kind of poly phrase, pedicotry of the press. Many of these anti-diologic tactics what I found in history

Catherine McKinley: can be found also at the more of contemporary, a community, family, and individual levels.

Catherine McKinley: And so these these tactics, such as divide and rule, you know, manipulate leaders to try to sign treater treaties, introduce alcohol as a form of kind of uh undermining the authority. Uh, you know, pitting tribes and families against each other, destroying field sources more. These this conquest divide and rule manipulation, cultural invasion.

Catherine McKinley: These are tactics that were brought in, and these really contrast the unity uh cohesion organization, cultural synthesis that were protective factors

Catherine McKinley: in the research that I've done across. You know, these twelve years I've seen these being tactics um manifest themselves in different ways, you know, if you look at conquest, and you have the boarding school Removal of children. Why, Why, people are scared of the child. Criminal desk justice system, you know, removing land uh pressing people through sharecropping uh roles,

Catherine McKinley: and then you can see at the uh institutional level right there's more of a governmental structure was brought in with it. Uh you know, Ira, in one thousand nine hundred and thirty-four, that that it was in post, or a different way of governing that change from

Catherine McKinley: selected to more family and power kind of based um people coming to the system with impunity because the jurisdictional problems and the lack of funding or resource. These are things that I heard from women and professionals. So people don't want to get treated in a system that will continue the same violence and follows the same ideology.

Catherine McKinley: And so these things follow these different levels. Committee family, five minister uh services, lack of reliability, these kind of complexities. Um in the system,

Catherine McKinley: and I also saw these at the family and relational level. So there will be families against each other. And if you look at the power dynamics, the simple power control real. These are what they are systemically and interpersonally, you know, manipulate it, Manipulation using children, family loved ones, divide and rule separating your loved ones. If you don't do what I say. I'm going to hurt your loved ones

Catherine McKinley: coercion. Prep. You know. Threat stocking, emotional. These these same tactics can be They're embodied right. They're embodied like fractals at the higher to lower levels, and they're internalized, and we we fragment ourselves with compartmental ourselves as lack of holistic beings. And So we hurt ourselves and each other because of these

Catherine McKinley: uh tools to divide and oppress, to gain land, to make a place their own. Um exploit labor based on really in the galicitarian types of Uh types of values. And I've seen that these

Catherine McKinley: these uh the effects of this have affected uh families that are generationally women and children across across the board

Continuing Education: three minutes.

Catherine McKinley: Yes, this we've been healthy families. Program really integrates the protective back factors that we have found in research, but also historically matrilineal connection to land, family and extended kinship, indigenous world views and culturation, spirituality and pay subsistence and food ways. We've integrated this

Catherine McKinley: in this program that prevents substance with some violence, and we also look at why and how it's working by using a community based participatory approach and implementation science. So we want to also build up the the communities

Catherine McKinley: uh that it's a ten session um program that focus on wellness, this framework of historical oppression. We center food, waste, communication, substance, abuse, um and violence prevention, and what are healthy relationships?

Catherine McKinley: Um: Emotional regulation problem. Solving people share a meal, include tribal food ways, and then they learn the same content, and they're developmentally tailored groups with um parents, children, young children, and the Ford age groups. Um they start with.

Catherine McKinley: Then they come back together with connecting my family and against um. This this a program, and this is talking in circles. It's. Family focuses medicine, real type

Catherine McKinley: values that i'm talking about you about the world views and teaching through like this your tree in different ways of communicating tribal stories. So still briefly, uh, we have done a pilot. We've seen that after the intervention there is improvements, we found an improvement in commutal mastery, feelings of social support, family resilience, and violence has an approved as well as substance abuse. Reid was reduced after the intervention as well as um, an anxiety and in depression, emotional regulation. And and then people even

Catherine McKinley: I, drink and eat at less sugar, sweetened beverages, and and ate and live in a more healthy way. We found interestingly that people who reported higher levels of historical oppression from regular declines, meaning something about understanding personal problems and systemic ways provides relief.

Catherine McKinley: So we need to start to connect those things in the present.

Catherine McKinley: Most importantly, if not uh, or more importantly, is building up the structure. So this is community based program. We've trained over sixty committee health representatives from the tribe. We um are working with the juvenile justice system in the court system and the Boys and Girls Club to sustain this program over time. We have over five hundred uh family participants and have um. People have gone in to get their Phds and and uh become educated in the process. We have decolonizing dialogue in our groups. We we do family talking circles,

Catherine McKinley: um and community Health representative talking circles, so we can have continued healing among the healers. I was just back there last week, and there were a number of suicide, and so, having um, you know, a a consistent place to heal in a tribal way with these talking circles has been really really important to build communities of help,

Catherine McKinley: and so i'm ending with seven seconds. But I just want to say, you, Coke and I do have a a self-care workshop of how we can kind of work to um dismantle our own colonial mindset. Um, and so you feel free to reach out to me if you'd like to join that. But you, Koki, thank you for thinking and uh about these issues, and I appreciate you being honored to be asked.

Katie Schultz: Thank you, Katherine. That was a master lesson, and putting a lot of information in fifteen minutes. Well, then, again. I want to encourage people. I've seen a couple of questions come through. Uh please do out to those we will get to those at the end.

Katie Schultz: Um, and i'm going to introduce our third and final panelists for today. Uh Dr. Andre Rose uh no Andre uh Dr. Jose is a professor of justice, and the Associate Dean for Academic and student Affairs in the College of Health at the University of Alaska Anchorage.

Katie Schultz: His research focuses on Violence against American Indian and Alaska, native women and men. He has been a visiting executive research fellow at the National Institute of Justice, and continues to work on Nij's program of research on violence against Indian women living in tribal communities.

Katie Schultz: Uh, he's here to present on findings from a national Survey, and i'm excited to hear more.

Andre Rosay: Thank you so much, Katie. Uh, let me share my screen.

Andre Rosay: Okay,

Andre Rosay: As Katie mentioned, my name is Andre Roset. I'm the Associate Dean in the College of Health at the University of Alaska Inkridge. Uh, before I begin, I want to first acknowledge that I have the privilege of living and working on the unseeded lands of the denying of people who have taken great care of this land since time and memorial,

Andre Rosay: and they continue to do so today. I also want to acknowledge. Uh, if I can move to the next slide,

Andre Rosay: the National Institute of Justice, who provided funding for the study, and, as others have mentioned, the opinions, findings and conclusions and recommendations of mine, and they do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Justice

Andre Rosay: today. I will provide a very brief summary

Andre Rosay: of uh the work uh that. I completed on this report that examined violence against American, Indian and Alaska native women and men uh the data that we're used for this report came from the national intimate partner and sexual Violence survey that was conducted by the Us. Centers for disease, control, and prevention

Andre Rosay: uh, in two thousand and ten Cdc. With some funding from Nij uh provided or conducted an oversample of Uh people who identified themselves as American, Indian or Uh Alaska native and using those data. Uh, I looked at the lifetime and pasture prevalence of psychological aggression, physical violence, stalking, and sexual violence. The report also provides detailed information about both the impact of violence

and the race of the perpetrators

Andre Rosay: and overall. There are five key findings uh from the study, and i'll start by showing a brief video that summarizes these key findings.

The stories of American Indians and Alaska natives are as varied and nuanced as the people themselves, but the latest study from the National Institute of Justice finds one troubling through

that links these stories the experience of high rates of violence,

like songs and oral histories. Science can raise awareness by quantifying the severity of violence. It's time to hear what the numbers are saying.

The vast majority of American, Indian and Alaska, Native women and men have experienced violence in their lifetime, and one in three have experienced recent violence in the past year.

Those levels are higher than the general population, but that's not where the inequalities end. The study also measures a range of impacts as well as services needed because of violence.

What's behind those numbers? Let's start with the finding that for American Indians and Alaska natives violence doesn't discriminate by gender, women and men share similar rates of victimization. That means almost three million American, Indian and Alaska, native women and men have been victims of violence

to put that number in perspective. Imagine, if everyone in the State of Iowa stood up, or every resident of Orlando, Dallas, Detroit, Anchorage, and Atlanta combined. That's the scale of the violence. But what about the scope?

The Nij study Breaks types of violence into four categories and violence against American Indians and Alaska natives is high across all of them. Take stalking, for example. It can be a gateway to more aggressive violence and repeated unwanted fear. Inducing experiences come in many forms

lifetime estimates of stalking for women in the study are almost double those of non-hispanic whites add male and female victims together, and that's more than one point. Two million people that would feel twenty sports stadiums if every single ticket holder had been stopped

being forced or coerced to engage in unwanted sexual activity is another form of violence.

I form all too familiar to American Indians and Alaska natives,

for example, these mothers, daughters, and sisters face almost two times the risk of sexual violence with penetration as non-hispanic white women

overall rates of physical violence by intimate partners in the past or present, are even higher, from being shoved to having a gun or knife used on them.

More than one in every two women and more than one, and every three men have experienced physical violence by intimate partners in their lifetimes comparatively much higher than the physical victimization rates over the lifetimes of non-hispanic whites.

Of course not. All violence is sexual or physical so the Nij Study also examines psychological aggression, for example, expressions of anger that seem dangerous or humiliating or controlling access to birth Control

overall. Psychological aggression affects more than one in every two women and men. Psychological aggression may not be as obvious as broken bones or bruises, but it is real among victims. Sixty three percent of women report partners tracking them,

and fifty five percent of women report being kept from family or friends. These are just a few findings, but remember they are numbers that correspond to real victims who would feel the entire state of Iowa.

Now picture, if ninety seven percent of women and ninety percent of men in Iowa were victimized by people of other races and ethnicities, interracial perpetrators who violated the safety of their schools, workplaces, parks, homes, and bedrooms. Numbers alone. Don't tell the whole story, but they do point to a dangerous gap.

Most federally recognized tribes. Don't, have the legal authority to criminally prosecute non-indians, even for crimes committed on tribal lands. So what does it all mean?

The impacts of high rates of violence against American Indians and Alaska natives range from missed days of work or school to physical injuries. It's not surprising that services are needed, like medical care to treat injuries. But here's where the Nij results. Uncover another glaring disparity.

Almost forty percent of female victims who need services can't get them compared with only fifteen percent of non-hispanic white female victims who fall through the cracks American Indians and Alaska natives deserve better and Now they're a science to prove it.

These numbers are not abstract. They bear witness to real people, mothers, girlfriends, brothers, and grandfathers.

Our hope is that this study will lead to a story of a new beginning one, where all of us listen to what the science is saying, what the victims are saying, and unite to prevent violence wherever it happens

You,

the stories of American Indians and Alaska natives are as varied and nuanced as the people.

Andre Rosay: There we go. Uh, many thanks to Terry Henry for, uh, of the Eastern band of Cherokee Indians for nearing them that video. Uh, And here are the five key findings that I want to focus on today in this presentation. Uh, and these were all covered in the video. First uh, most American, Indian and Alaska native women and men.

Andre Rosay: I have experienced violence in their lifetime. Second, we found that the rates were fairly similar for men and women, but they were victimized in different ways.

Andre Rosay: Third, uh, as other research has shown, we've uncovered the victimization rates are higher for people who identified as American Indian or Alaskan native. Then for people who are identified as being non-hispanic and white.

Andre Rosay: Fourth uh American, Indian, and Alaska. Native female victims were more likely to need services, but it was also more challenging for them to access those services,

Andre Rosay: and finally we found that inter racial violence was much more prevalent than intra racial violence.

Andre Rosay: So in the remaining slides i'll provide just some very uh key statistics on these five findings.

Andre Rosay: Um!

Andre Rosay: We found, uh, that more than eighty of American Indian and Alaska native women and men had experienced violence in their lifetime. That's more than four out of every five American, Indian or Alaska native person, or almost three million,

Andre Rosay: and the lifetime prevalence rates were similar for women and men with eighty-four percent uh women and eighty-two of men reporting that they had experienced violence at some point in their lifetime.

Andre Rosay: We found that the lifetime victimization rates for psychological aggression and physical violence were fairly similar for both uh women and men.

Andre Rosay: But we found that women were significantly more likely to have experienced sexual violence, and they were significantly more likely to have experienced, Uh stalking more than half

Andre Rosay: that experienced sexual violence at some point in their lifetime, and almost half that experienced stalking

Andre Rosay: as noted in another research. We also found that the prevalence rates were higher for people who identify as American, Indian or Alaskan native. Therefore people would identify as white and uh non-hispanic for the lifetime rates American, Indian and Alaska. Native women were eighteen percent more likely to have experienced violence,

Andre Rosay: and men were twenty-eight percent more likely to have experienced violence.

Andre Rosay: The differences were even greater in the past year rates, where we found that forty percent of American, Indian and Alaskan native women had experienced violence just in the past year,

Andre Rosay: and they were seventy-four percent more likely to have experienced violence in the past year than non-hispanic uh white women.

Andre Rosay: More than a third of American Indian and Alaska native men had experienced balance in the past year, and they were thirty-five percent more likely than non-hispanic white men to experience violence.

Andre Rosay: We also found as I mentioned before that American, Indian and Alaska native uh female victims were more likely to need services. Forty-one percent reported having physical injuries, Forty-nine percent reported that they needed services, and more than a third reported that they need a medical care.

Andre Rosay: This may indicate that the severity of violence is greater among American, Indian and Alaskan native women.

Andre Rosay: Unfortunately they were also. It was also more difficult for them to access services. More than a third Were not able to access services

Andre Rosay: in this graph. We're looking at uh victims who needed services, and what you can see is that among American, Indian and Alaska native female victims who needed services more than a third, were not able to get services. So again, it was more challenging

Andre Rosay: uh, for them to access uh services.

Andre Rosay: Thank you. Uh. The The final finding that we focused on was the level of intra, racial and interracial violence. And, as you can see in this graph, almost all American, Indian and Alaskan is native victims

Andre Rosay: had experienced violence by a perpetrator who was not American, Indian, or Alaska native,

Andre Rosay: and about a third had experienced violence from a perpetrator who was American, Indian, or Alaska native, and this was true for every type of violence that we examined

Andre Rosay: eighty-five to ninety-six of American Indian, and alaska native victims had experience at some point in their life violence by a perpetrator who was of a different race and ethnicity.

Andre Rosay: So in terms of our key conclusions uh this study obviously had, uh, as every city does lots of limitations. Those are covered in the report, and so we must continue our work to raise awareness and our understanding of violence against American Indians, Uh and Alaskan natives.

Andre Rosay: Uh, the results do show that there are continuing disparities in both health outcomes and in access to health care, and that finding supports uh the greater need for services and our efforts to increase services for American, Indian and Alaska native populations.

Andre Rosay: And then, finally, as you saw, the results show that inter racial violence was far more prevalent than in racial violence, and that supports the efforts of tribes to prosecute non internal offenders.

Andre Rosay: So in my fifteen minutes. Those are the the five key findings uh, from the study and some of the key implications. Thank you all for joining us today.

Katie Schultz: Thank you. Andre uh, I always appreciate the um

Katie Schultz: creative ways of disseminating reporting findings. If you're like me, if you get over about a hundred and fifty. I'm like I Don't know how many people that is. And so some of those data visualizations, I think, are really

Katie Schultz: helpful and powerful.

Katie Schultz: I'll also put in a personal Thank you to Andre for waiting through that dense, complicated data.

Katie Schultz: Uh, I believe he was even answering emails of mine when I was finishing my dissertation in two thousand and sixteen saying, When is that report gonna come out? When is that report gonna come out so that we could utilize this national sample? Um as a baseline. So thank you for that. Andre. Um. I've noticed that Tina has been putting resources into the chat list, So if people haven't been

Katie Schultz: um noticing those. There's a couple of resources there. Um! I'm gonna open up with a question for the Nebraska folks uh that was put into the chat. Um, uh, I'll just read it all out loud

Katie Schultz: in the Nebraska research. Was there a difference between native Americans who live on reservations and those that live in other rural or urban places

Emily Wright: so well. It's Tara, are you there? Because I know we had some breakdowns by um

Emily Wright: jurisdictions,

Emily Wright: but we didn't report any of that stuff.

Emily Wright: So you want to overview that or

Tara Richards: so. We did create some heat maps um for the counts. Um, but that's at the

Tara Richards: jurisdictional level like Dr. Right indicated. So we didn't do any analysis. Um based on the location of where the person went missing. And mostly that is because that data

Tara Richards: was almost always missing from the um publicly available missing person's data. So the best we could do is identify the jurisdiction to which the missing person's report was reported.

Tara Richards: Um. So like the the basically the law enforcement agency, right? That was um responsible for taking that missing Person's report

Tara Richards: um, which really does not get at the question that this person is asking. But what I will say is that in this next study um that is also being generously supported by Nij um, where we're working with that um India Indian Affairs Department in the State of New Mexico. We really want to get um

Tara Richards: much more into the context of missing persons cases than we were able to in the first Nebraska study. Um, and so we hope to to do a lot more um in terms of trying to gather that contextual information around. You know

Tara Richards: why a person goes missing, and how that case is resolved. Um. So stay tuned. We hope to have those types of answers for you soon.

Katie Schultz: Thank you relatedly. I had a question in those three data sources that you used about

Katie Schultz: how uh the same persons are identified as American, Indian or Alaska native, as we know, there's often complications that under count. And so I was just curious about that. Speak to that at all.

Emily Wright: Yeah, go. Tara.

Tara Richards: Um. So it it was the rate, you know. Racial identity was um based on how it was reported. Um, which is important, because, for example, Hispanic ethnicity is not a category that is used. So

Tara Richards: we couldn't um. Look at You know folks who are identifying as white non hispanic versus white spin, et cetera. Um, Because what was important about the study was, we did look at the scope of all missing persons, so that we could then try to um examine missing this across these different racial groups. But you bring up a really good point, and we talk about it in depth. In the Nij final report. And um the manuscript that came out of that data is, we just don't know right? We don't know the level of

Tara Richards: um misclassification, right um, and we don't, you know. Um, and that's uh again. Why, trying to liaise with the um tribal communities and identify um folks who were not reported missing, which we we did do that. Um. This was a partnership with the Ne Nebraska Commission on Indian affairs, so we we did a lot of um working through the Commission

Tara Richards: trying to get at that information, and then also having the Commission cross-check the data that we were pulling down from this list um to really try to understand if anyone who was listed on the missing persons list as um not American, Indian, Alaska native were, or vice versa. Um, but we we weren't able to capture anyone who was not reported officially recorded, missing, and we didn't identify any misclassification. However, that

Tara Richards: absolutely does not mean that was not um going on. It just means that even though we made attempts, we we we didn't uncover those phenomena,

Emily Wright: and I will say I think it was about ten percent,

Emily Wright: maybe up to thirteen percent of the cases didn't have race at all,

Emily Wright: so um they could have been native. They could have been not native, and there's no way for us to

Emily Wright: figure that out.

Katie Schultz: Thanks. I think it's such an important point to make when we're pointing out these sort of rates and comparisons of um.

Katie Schultz: How I I don't want to say flawed, but I will say flawed. So much of our data we work with is uh, and what the implications are for getting it more more accurate estimates.

Tara Richards: Yeah. And so one of the things that we um usually say in these presentations that I know we were really short on time is we have this slide, and we talk about how we wanted to. Um say what we do, do, what we say and show our work, because we realize that all of the all of these types of studies have so many limitations and measurement issues. And so we we can't speak to all, all, all people and all things right. We can only speak to this like one sliver

Tara Richards: um of the problem that you know we were able to measure with our design, and it's only a starting point, and everyone who comes behind us will hopefully improve upon it.

Katie Schultz: Um!

Katie Schultz: There is a question in our question and answer for Dr. Right? Um. Can you describe the linking process you use to link missing persons records to see if they are associated with violent crimes.

Emily Wright: I I think it was just names. The names are all available on the missing person's list, so we had um the the names and their racial uh category.

Emily Wright: And we sent that, I want to say to Nebraska State Troll to do a cross check with their um cases to see if any of the names that were identified as natives um were associated either as a perpetrator or a victim potential victim. In

Emily Wright: the cases uh as managed by the Nebraska State Patrol,

Tara Richards: and Tara can tell me if i'm wrong on that. Together we are one person, So that's that's right. I mean I I. The one thing I would add is the Nebraska Missing Persons list right? This is this is being, you know, drawn down from law enforcement data right? So the Nebraska State Patrol could see more information on missing persons than we could right because we were pulling it down from the public facing Portal,

Tara Richards: but Nebraska State Patrol controls the Nebraska Missing person's list. So by submitting the the names,

Tara Richards: ages and rate, you know, race, that racial ethnic I identifiers based on the data we could pull down from the missing person's list. They could actually see like what was that instant report number right um for that missing person.

Tara Richards: Um, So they had a lot more information than we had with the publicly available data. And, as Dr. Wright said, you know all what what they reported back to us was that none of the missing persons. Um, that we submitted to them were um

Tara Richards: uh missing in uh sort of collaboration with uh an Internet report of a of of a crime, right? Nor where were there any um,

Tara Richards: you know, reported leads, et cetera, regarding their missingness being an association with a a crime,

Katie Schultz: you know. Did you have something you wanted to add to that question,

Katie Schultz: trying to look at three places at once?

Katie Schultz: There was a question. I will note there was a question uh for Dr. Rosa about um any plans to

Katie Schultz: follow up

Katie Schultz: with the uh report? The survey again to do another um

Katie Schultz: surveillance. And uh, Tina did answer that that Nij is in discussion with Cdc. Right now. Do you have anything to add to that?

Katie Schultz: Okay,

Katie Schultz: she is doing all our heavy lifting over here in the chat box. Um, there have been two questions, one of which was, uh, uh, Dr. Mckinley responded to, but questions from non-native uh folks who are interested in working with

Katie Schultz: uh tribal or indigenous communities, and I wanted to give the opportunity to our Omaha crew, and Andre uh, if you wanted to share any thoughts or ideas uh sounds like a couple of different people have that question. Or Dr. Mckinley, if you want to add anything,

Andre Rosay: I guess I can go ahead and start. I'll put a plug in for a great book by uh Shawn Wilson called Research the ceremony. Great place to start uh, you provide some wonderful advice uh for how to do research uh in engine country.

Andre Rosay: Uh, and he has lots of wonderful, wonderful recommendations. But the one that I would highlight is really to start with a question that is of interest to the people that we are doing research on too often. I think we can sit back in our offices and think Oh, wouldn't it be great if we did a research project on this uh, but unless that is of interest to the local communities,

Andre Rosay: uh is uh not going to go very far. So so, starting with a good research question, and working with tribal partners to develop that research questions, I think, is a is a key part of the process.

Catherine McKinley: So i'll just add a little bit. There. There's a lot like like um, Hector, Jose said, which I've signed your work so many times. It's so fun to see you in the in the pleasure. But um, you know it. There's a lot of great models like you mentioned. And um, I think the challenge, typically too, is also kind of what worldview people bring in. Um. I think of Michael Hart some really great work on indigenous world as well. So that's one thing it's kind of getting really educated about um, what positionality you bring in, and what that might mean.

Catherine McKinley: Um! And then, you know, following some of these protocols of like, maybe these participatory research really spending time um listening, following um kind of being secondary in terms of uh direction,

Catherine McKinley: because that only not only helps it, you know the success is because of that, because you're following what's in the leading people about what's needed and what's real, And that's really why I definitely have seen that um play out um, but also it really is a big commitment, because the implications are high, and and that there's you're not entering where there's a baseline of trust or equity. You're you're um entering where there's five hundred years of injustice. So I would say, only in in, you know. Do it? Only if you really can. Um be, you know, Honor those responsibilities

Catherine McKinley: in those relationships. Otherwise, you know, maybe find some other way to like help with infrastructure or resources in more of a secondary way because it. The implications are really high right to to continue that harm. And so just be really clear about that, and have mentors. Um,

Catherine McKinley: you know, cultural insiders to guide that process. Um. And so I think that's really really important to be embedded in in more support. And um follow safety kind of protocols, you know. Cultural safety protocols. Really,

Emily Wright: i'll just say that um

we put together Sort of a think

Emily Wright: um a thought piece on um how to approach uh research in indigenous communities. Um, And it's available online somewhere. I don't know um, but

Emily Wright: you know there's a lot of things that we could say. That would be, I think, instructional and helpful. But I totally agree. You want to be responsive to the needs, the desires, the interests of the communities that you're working with. Um. You want to make sure that you're

Emily Wright: not doing anything that you're not meaning to do, but that would look like it was being ex um exploited.

Um,

Emily Wright: and I think you have to.

Emily Wright: Um.

Emily Wright: There's not a ton of us who do this work because it's not super easy,

Emily Wright: and especially if you study violence, victimization, stuff like that. It can be uh emotionally

Emily Wright: difficult as well. Um. So I think you have to have a passion and sort of a desire or a calling to do it. And um again Check your intentions,

Emily Wright: um, and check your sensitivities, I would, I would say, but Sheena wrote that primarily wrote the paper that we put out on the American Society of Criminologies um Newsletter and um, I think that it's uh It's it's pretty help

Emily Wright: uh helpful. Um! It's not about It's just a few pages. Um,

Emily Wright: so.

Emily Wright: And it was a real pleasure to get to see everybody in person. By the way, I've read a lot of people's work here, and and kind of fan growing as well.

Katie Schultz: I um unfortunately have the job of keeping a eye on the time, and I think that is such a lovely place to have stopped. I absolutely hear you on, uh, you know, being a big fan of all of the work that you're doing. Um,

Katie Schultz: I think you've all made really important uh contributions in this area, I I think, appreciated all your answers for folks who are interested in working with uh communities that maybe aren't their own. This goes beyond just indigenous communities, and you know, thinking about

Katie Schultz: flexibility, patience and humility are the three things I tell my students, and they talk about any community that you're entering. And you know the importance, as all of our panelists said, of letting community really lead the sort of intention and purpose and primary questions

Katie Schultz: having deeply reciprocal relationships. Uh: so what you want is, and always what they want or what you need, isn't always what they need. So being mindful of that, and transparent about that um

Katie Schultz: and uh, you know, I was also struck by how uh, many of our panelists place this within this larger historical context, and being aware of what you bring into this um within that larger construct and what you represent, and where you have power, and where that comes from in those relationships. So

Katie Schultz: uh with that note I want to thank everyone for spending the well for me. It's afternoon, I know Andre Hasn't even cracked noon yet. Um up there in Alaska.

Katie Schultz: Uh, so I want to thank you all for spending the afternoon with us. Uh, I hope this is helpful. There are resources in the chat before people sign off. If you want to take a quick review of that, and thank you to the Consortium for making space uh for us to really focus on these issues of violence and indigenous communities this month.

Catherine McKinley: Thank you. Great job, Dr. Schultz. Thank you. Everyone good to see everyone. Thank you.
    
  
Disclaimer:
              Opinions or points of view expressed in these recordings represent those of the speakers and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. Any commercial products and manufacturers discussed in these recordings are presented for informational purposes only and do not constitute product approval or endorsement by the U.S. Department of Justice.
  
Date Published: November 8, 2022
    
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