A member of the Sioux and Assiniboine tribes, poet
M.L. Smoker earned a BA at
Pepperdine University and an MFA at the
University of Montana, where she received the Richard Hugo Memorial Scholarship. Smoker also studied at
UCLA, where she received the Arianna and Hannah Yellow Thunder Scholarship, and the
University of Colorado, where she was a Battrick Fellow. Influenced by John Steinbeck, James Welch, and Philip Levine, Smoker composes free verse poems that focus on personal struggle and identity and engage Native American history, language, and culture. As Smoker noted in a From the Fishouse audio recording, "[B]eing a poet allows me to interact and observe and be a witness to so many things that go on in the world around us, large things that go on in our community but also things that happen in our day-to-day lives, and I'm very honored to have the chance and the opportunity to slow down occasionally and pay attention to those things that can sometimes get lost in the greater scheme of things and in our lives." Smoker is the author of the poetry collection
Another Attempt at Rescue (2005). With Melissa Kwasny, she co-edited
I Go to the Ruined Place: Contemporary Poems in Defense of Global Human Rights (2009). Smoker lives in Helena, Montana, where she works in the Indian Education Division of the Office of Public Instruction.
Sterling HolyWhiteMountain grew up on the Blackfeet Reservation, where he lived the first part of his life according to the laws of the local basketball religion. He holds a BA in English Creative Writing from the
University of Montana, a Masters in Creative Writing from the
Iowa Writers' Workshop, and was a James C. McCreight Fiction Fellow at the
University of Wisconsin. Currently he is working on a collection of novellas and stories. His stories have appeared in
Off the Path: An Anthology of 21st Century Montana American Indian Writers, Volumes 1 & 2.
Brooke Pepion Swaney (Blackfeet & Salish) is a film director and writer, who received her MFA in Film and Television from
Tisch School of the Arts, New York University. She made several short films while at NYU, including
Continental Divide (2008 ImagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival and 2008 Winnipeg Aboriginal Film Festival). Prior to attending NYU, she worked at a non-profit, the Indian Law Resource Center, a legal organization dedicated to protecting the land and culture of Indigenous people throughout the Western Hemisphere. In 2003, she graduated with honors from
Stanford in psychology, writing an honors thesis on the media's effect on American Indians. Her first film,
The Indigenoid, showed a young Native man awakening to the Native stereotypes in everyday life. It was nominated for Best Live Short at the 2005 American Indian Film Festival in San Francisco. Brooke was accepted to the
Montana Artists Refuge during their 2009 American Indian Artists Residency and their October Writers Residency. In 2009, she was also a finalist in a time-sensitive short film competition for the Madrid tourism board.
Justin Torres' debut novel,
We the Animals, was published in 2011 and quickly became a national hit, making it onto the bestseller lists of, among others, the
New York Times, the
Los Angeles Times, and the
Boston Globe. The novel garnered universal praise from critics, appeared on various best books of 2011 lists, and won prizes such as the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award and the Fred R. Brown Literary Award. It has been translated into fifteen languages and is currently also being adapted into a film. In addition to his first novel, Justin Torres has written a number of pieces of short fiction and essays, which appeared in venues like the
New Yorker, Harper's, and the
Guardian. He holds a BA in Latin American History and an MFA in Fiction from the
Iowa Writers' Workshop. In the past, he has been a Wallace Stegner Fellow at
Stanford University, a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at
Harvard, and a creative writing fellow at the National Endowment for the Arts. He has taught at universities around the country and is currently Assistant Professor of English at
UCLA.
IAIA MFA PROGRAM DIRECTOR
Jon Davis is the author of four full-length poetry collections-
Improbable Creatures, Preliminary Report, Scrimmage of Appetite, and
Dangerous Amusements; five chapbooks; and
Heteronymy: An Anthology, a limited-edition letterpress book in collaboration with the artist
Jamison Chas Banks. Davis also co-translated Iraqi poet
Naseer Hassan's
Dayplaces. He has received a Lannan Literary Award in Poetry, the Lavan Prize from the Academy of American Poets, the Off the Grid Poetry Prize, and two NEA Fellowships. He directs the MFA in Creative Writing at the Institute of American Indian Arts, where he has taught since 1990.
FACULTY
Ramona Ausubel is the author, most recently, of the novel
Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty (Penguin 2016). Her first novel,
No One is Here Except All of Us, won of the PEN Center USA Literary Award for Fiction, the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award, and was a Finalist for the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award. Her collection of stories,
A Guide to Being Born, was one the
New York Times' 100 Notable Books of the year and a
San Francisco Chronicle best book of the year. Her work has appeared in
The New Yorker, The Paris Review Daily, One Story, Salon (online),
The Best American Fantasy and was shortlisted in
The Best American Short Stories and
The Best American Non-Required Reading. A new collection of stories,
Awayland, is forthcoming.
Marie-Helene Bertino is the author of the novel
2 A.M. at The Cat's Pajamas and the story collection
Safe as Houses. Her work has received The O. Henry Award, The Pushcart Prize, The Iowa Short Fiction Award, and fellowships from The Center for Fiction NYC, Sewanee, MacDowell and Hedgebrook Writers Colonies. She teaches at
NYU and lives in Brooklyn, where she is an Editor-at-Large for
Catapult Magazine. In Fall of 2017 she was The Frank O'Connor International Short Story Fellow in Cork, Ireland.
Sherwin Bitsui is originally from White Cone, Arizona, on the Navajo Reservation. He is Diné of the Todich'ii'nii (Bitter Water Clan), born for the Tl'izilani (Many Goats Clan). He is the author of
Shapeshift (University of Arizona Press, 2003) and
Flood Song (Copper Canyon Press, 2009). His recent honors include a 2011 Lannan Foundation Literary Fellowship and a 2011 Native Arts & Culture Foundation Arts Fellowship. He is also the recipient of a 2010 PEN Open Book Award, an American Book Award, and a Whiting Writers Award.
Kimberly Blaeser is a Professor at the
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee where she teaches Creative Writing and Native American Literatures. She is the author of three collections of poetry:
Apprenticed to Justice, Absentee Indians and Other Poems, and
Trailing You. Blaeser is Anishinaabe, an enrolled member of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, and grew up on the White Earth Reservation in northwestern Minnesota. She is the editor of
Stories Migrating Home: A Collection of Anishinaabe Prose and Traces in Blood, Bone, and Stone: Contemporary Ojibwe Poetry. Blaeser is currently at work on a collection of "Picto-Poems" combining her photographs and poetry. Her creative nonfiction, short stories, and scholarship have appeared widely in journals and anthologies.
Jennifer Elise Foerster, an alumna of the
Institute of American Indian Arts, received her MFA from the
Vermont College of Fine Arts, and is completing a PhD at the
University of Denver. She is the recipient of a 2017 NEA Creative Writing Fellowship, a Lannan Foundation Writing Residency Fellowship, and was a Wallace Stegner Fellow in Poetry at
Stanford University. A member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation of Oklahoma, her first book of poems,
Leaving Tulsa, was published by the University of Arizona Press in 2013. Her second book,
Bright Raft in the Afterweather, is forthcoming in 2018. Her poems have recently appeared in
Colorado Review, Eleven Eleven, The Brooklyn Rail, and
Kenyon Review Online.
Santee Frazier is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma. He holds a BFA from the
Institute of American Indian Arts and an MFA from
Syracuse University. He is the recipient of various awards including: a Syracuse University Fellowship, a Lannan Foundation Residency Fellowship, The School for Advanced Research Indigenous Writer in Residence, and a Native Arts and Cultures Foundation Fellowship. His poems have appeared in
American Poet, Narrative Magazine, Ontario Review, Ploughshares, and other literary journals. His first collection of poetry,
Dark Thirty, was published by the University of Arizona Press in 2009.
Sydney Freeland (Diné) is an Emmy-nominated filmmaker. Her debut feature film,
Drunktown's Finest, premiered at the
2014 Sundance Film Festival and went on to win a number of awards, including the Grand Jury Prize and HBO Outstanding First Feature awards at LA Outfest 2014, as well as a GLAAD Media Award nomination for Outstanding Feature. In 2016, she directed the web series
Her Story, which was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Short Form Drama. Sydney is also a recipient of the 2015 Fox Global Director's Initiative, 2015
Sundance Women's Fellowship, 2015 Ford Fellowship, 2014 Time Warner Fellowship, and a 2004 Fulbright Scholarship. She was selected to participate in both the 2010 Sundance Screenwriting and Directing Labs and the 2009 Sundance Native Lab. Recent projects include directing the Netflix original film
Deidra and Laney Rob a Train and directing an episode of the TV series,
Heathers. Sydney currently lives and works in Los Angeles.
Pam Houston's most recent book is
Contents May Have Shifted, published by W.W. Norton in 2012. She is also the author of two collections of linked short stories,
Cowboys Are My Weakness and
Waltzing the Cat, the novel,
Sight Hound, and a collection of essays,
A Little More About Me, all published by W.W. Norton. Her stories have been selected for volumes of
Best American Short Stories, The O. Henry Awards, The 2013 Pushcart Prize, and
Best American Short Stories of the Century. She is the winner of the Western States Book Award, the WILLA award for contemporary fiction, The Evil Companions Literary Award and multiple teaching awards. She is Professor of English at
UC Davis, directs the literary nonprofit Writing By Writers and teaches in
The Pacific University low residency MFA program. and at writer's conferences around the country and the world. She lives on a ranch at 9,000 feet in Colorado near the headwaters of the Rio Grande.
Toni Jensen (Métis) is the author of
From the Hilltop, a collection of linked stories published through the Native Storiers Series at the University of Nebraska Press. Her fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in
Stories from the South: The Year's Best, 2007;
Best of the West: Stories from the Wide Side of the Missouri, 2011; and
Denver Quarterly, among others. She holds a PhD from
Texas Tech University and teaches in the MFA program at the
University of Arkansas.
Joan Naviyuk Kane (Iñupiaq) was born in Anchorage, Alaska, where she lives with her husband and sons. She is a graduate of
Harvard College and
Columbia University's School of the Arts. She won a 2009 Whiting Writer's Award for her first book,
The Cormorant Hunter's Wife (NorthShore Press / Alaska Literary Series), and the 2012 Donald Hall Prize in Poetry and a 2014 American Book Award for her second book,
Hyperboreal (Pittsburgh Press). She is also the author of
The Straits (Voices from the American Land) and
Milk Black Carbon (Pittsburgh Press). She has been the recipient of Individual Artist Awards and an Artist Fellowship from the Rasmuson Foundation, the Alaska Literary Award, and a Native Arts and Cultures Foundation Fellowship, as well as residencies at the School for Advanced Research,
Haverford College, and the Hermitage Artist Retreat. Her work has recently appeared in
The Best American Poetry, Boston Review, and
South.
Chip Livingston is the mixed-blood Creek author of four books: two collections of poetry,
Crow-Blue, Crow-Black (2012) and
Museum of False Starts (2010); a collection of short stories and creative nonfiction,
Naming Ceremony (2014); and a novel,
Owls Don't Have to Mean Death (2017). His writing has received awards from Native Writers' Circle of the Americas, Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers, and the AABB Foundation. Chip's writing has appeared in
Ploughshares, Prairie Schooner, South Dakota Review, Cincinnati Review, and on the Academy of American Poets' and Poetry Foundation's websites. He has taught at the
University of Colorado,
University of the Virgin Islands, Brooklyn College, and
Regis University.
Terese Mailhot is from Seabird Island Band. Her book,
Heart Berries: A Memoir, is forthcoming from Counterpoint Press and Doubleday Canada (2018). She is a Tecumseh Postdoctoral Fellow at
Purdue University. Her work has been featured in The Rumpus, Carve Magazine,
The Offing, The Feminist Wire, Burrow Press Review, Huffington Post Canada, Indian Country Today, Global Citizen, and elsewhere. Her essay, "I Know I'll Go," was listed as notable in Best American Essays 2016. She is a Native American Journalists Association award winner and also received fellowships from Southwestern Association for Indian Arts, Writing By Writers, and Vermont Studio Center.
Tommy Orange was born and raised in Oakland, California. He is an enrolled member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma. His first novel,
There There will be published by Alfred A. Knopf in the summer of 2018.
Derek Palacio received his MFA in Creative Writing from
Ohio State University. His short story
Sugarcane appeared in
The O. Henry Prize Stories 2013, and his novella,
How to Shake the Other Man, was published by Nouvella Books. His debut novel,
The Mortifications, was published in 2016 by Tim Duggan Books, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group. He is the co-director, with
Claire Vaye Watkins, of the Mojave School, a free creative writing workshop for teenagers in rural Nevada. He lives and teaches in Ann Arbor, MI.
Migizi Pensoneau was born and raised in Minnesota, and attended
Wesleyan University. Pensoneau has worked for several Hollywood studios and independent companies as a writer and a producer for film and television. He is the recipient of awards, commissions, fellowships, and grants from ABC/Disney, The
Institute of American Indian Arts, the
Sundance Institute, and the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, among others. Migizi has published several pieces on the interaction of American Indians and popular culture. He recently received his MFA in Creative Writing from the
Institute of American Indian Arts, and is a co-founder and writer for the popular comic group the 1491s.
Ismet Prcic was born in Tuzla, Bosnia-Herzegovina and immigrated to the United States in 1996. His debut novel
Shards was published in 2011 by Black Cat, imprint of Grove Press to critical acclaim, winning the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for first fiction, the Writers Center First Novel Prize, the Oregon Book Award and many others. It was a
New York Times Notable Book of the Year and has been translated into nine languages. A recipient of a 2010 National Endowment for the Arts award for fiction he is also a Sundance and Jerusalem screenwriting lab fellow. He co-wrote the screenplay for the film
Imperial Dreams which premiered in January at this year's
Sundance Film Festival and won the audience award in its category.
James Thomas Stevens is an Associate Professor in the BFA Creative Writing Program at the
Institute of American Indian Arts. A member of the Akwesasne Mohawk Nation in upstate New York, Stevens grew up between three reservations, the two where his grandparents came from, Akwesasne Territory and Six Nations Reserve, and the one where they settled, the Tuscarora Nation. Stevens earned his MFA in Creative Writing from
Brown University. He has taught at
Haskell Indian Nations University and the
State University of New York at Fredonia. Stevens has published seven books of poetry, including
Combing the Snakes from His Hair, for which he was awarded a 2000 Whiting Writer's Award,
A Bridge Dead in the Water, Mohawk/Samoa: Transmigrations (with Caroline Sinavaiana),
Bulle/Chimere, and
Tokinish. His work has been anthologized in works such as
Genocide of the Mind, Visit Teepee Town, and
Sovereign Bones.
Ken White is a co-writer and co-producer of the feature film
Winter in the Blood, adapted from James Welch's novel of the same name, and co-director and co-writer of the short film
Universal VIP. He has written or co-written ten feature scripts. His poetry has appeared in
The Boston Review, The Tusculum Review, Columbia: A Journal of Literature and Art, Versal, Omniverse, Manor House Quarterly, Spork, Horsethief, and
Poets.org, among others. He is the author of the books of poems,
Eidolon (Peel Press 2013), and
The Getty Fiend (Les Figues Press 2017), as well as the chapbook
Middlemost Constantine (Spork 2017).
