Farina King, a citizen of the Navajo Nation, is Associate Professor of History and affiliated faculty of Cherokee and Indigenous Studies at Northeastern State University, Tahlequah, in the homelands of the Cherokee Nation and United Keetoowah Band of Cherokees. She is also the director and founder of the NSU Center for Indigenous Community Engagement. She received her Ph.D. at Arizona State University in U.S. History. King specializes in twentieth-century Native American Studies, especially American Indian boarding school histories. She is the author of The Earth Memory Compass: Diné Landscapes and Education in the Twentieth Century, and co-author with Michael P. Taylor and James R. Swensen of Returning Home: Diné Creative Works from the Intermountain Indian School (November 2021). She is the current President of the Southwest Oral History Association.
As a faculty and committee member at Northeastern State University (NSU), I acknowledge and respect that the campuses of NSU, ᎤᏴᏢᎢ ᎧᎸᎬ ᎢᏗᏜ ᏍᎦᏚᎩ ᏗᏕᏠᏆᏍᏗᎢ, are on the ancestral homelands of diverse Indigenous peoples, including, but not limited to, Caddos, Osages, Wichitas, Kickapoos, Lakotas, Quapaws, Cherokees, and Muscogees.
The NSU-Tahlequah, ᏓᎵᏆ, campus shares space with the headquarters and homelands of ᏣᎳᎩᎯ ᎠᏰᎵ, the Cherokee Nation, and ᎠᏂᎩᏚᏩᎩ ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯ, the United Keetoowah Band of Cherokees. The NSU campuses in Muskogee and Broken Arrow are within the Muscogee Nation, homelands of Este Mvskokvlke Paksvnke, Mucv-Nettv, Pakse, Muscogee People, Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow.
NSU originates from the Cherokee National Female Seminary founded by the Cherokee Nation in the nineteenth century. I commit to continually learn about Cherokee and Indigenous peoples and issues and build relationships with all beings in these lands. I encourage you to further understand and respect the First Peoples of lands in which you dwell.
UPCOMING EVENTS
February 2-4, 2022: 22nd Annual American Indian Studies Association Conference, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona.
February 4, 2022, Virtual Book Talks about Returning Home with Maricopa Community Colleges and the Phoenix Indian Center.
12 pm- 1 pm, February 8, 2022, CCWH E-Session with Farina King about Oral History.
1 pm MST, February 8, 2022, Virtual Book Talk about Returning Home with Arizona State University Library.
February 10, 2022, Virtual Talk about Dził ya’ ołta’ (“The School Inside the Mountain”) and “Returning Home: Diné Creative Works from the Intermountain Indian School,” Crow Canyon Archaeological Center, Cortez, Colorado.
March 3, 2022: Diné and Native American Educational Histories and Experiences, Rehoboth Christian School, New Mexico.
March 16, 2022, Book Talk about Returning Home with the Fayetteville Public Library.
March 22-24, 2022: “No One Exists in Isolation: International Latter-day Saints and Their Neighbours,” Global Mormon Studies, Coventry University, England.
March 26, 2022, Diné Women in Medicine and Healing Through Generations (virtual talk), Museum of Native American History, Bentonville, Arkansas.
7 pm CT, March 29, 2022, Kansas Open Books/Kansas Indigenous History webinar.
March 31-April 3, 2022: “Historicizing COVID-19 in Navajo Nation,” Organization of American Historians Annual Meeting, Boston.
April 1-3, 2022: Southwest Oral History Association Annual Conference, University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
April 4-5, 2022: Mapping Tahlequah History Workshop, Northeastern State University, Tahlequah, Oklahoma.
April 4-9, 2022: American Indian Symposium, Center for Tribal Studies, Northeastern State University, Tahlequah, Oklahoma.
April 14-15, 2022: “Interpreters in Western History” Symposium, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. See the Call for Proposals:
May 20-21, 2022: 2nd Railroads in Native America Gathering and Symposium, Ogden, Utah. Download our Call for Submissions:
August 4-6, 2022, Workshop: “Indigenous Perspectives on the Meanings of Lamanite,” University of Utah, Salt Lake City.
Read more about Farina King’s recent events.
Boarding School Survival
As the public now decries the unmarked graves of Indigenous children of residential and boarding schools, many Native families are thinking, “We know. Finally, they’re paying attention!” After all the work that many Native communities and intellectuals and activists have been doing, people are noticing and condemning, unlike any time before, the terror and nightmare … Continue reading Boarding School Survival
I exist because my father survived boarding school
“I did not run away from the education.” –My father, Phil Smith In the first episode of the Native Circles podcast that I started with Sarah Newcomb, we address issues of Indigenous boarding schools. In this blog piece, I continue to reflect on the impacts of Indian boarding schools in my own family and life. … Continue reading I exist because my father survived boarding school
Support University Presses
These are hard times, I know. But universities and education are getting hit especially hard, and this includes our wonderful university presses. My first book, The Earth Memory Compass: Diné Landscapes and Education in the Twentieth Century, was published in 2018 by the University Press of Kansas and we (the authors of the books published … Continue reading Support University Presses
Farina King, Ph.D. 
Thank you so much for speaking to our group last night, the Indian Territory Genealogical and Historical Society. You didn’t just speak to us. You made your Navajo people come alive and allowed us to
“meet” your family and understand a small part of what it meant to be Navajo in earlier times. Thank you again.
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Ahéhee’! Thank you, Diana, for coming and supporting this work and listening to my journey with family history. I appreciate your encouraging and kind words. Best wishes, Farina
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I’m pleased to let you know that the videos of our “Faith is Action, Stewardship and the Climate” symposium are on our YouTube channel. You may have already seen them shared on Facebook or other platforms. Thanks again for your excellent presentations.
We encourage you to share them on your social media and tag our organization @MormonStewards.
Hashtags you could include are:#ActOnClimate #MormonStewards #EverySaintASteward #FaithIsAction
Take care,
Marc Coles-Ritchie
board chair
Mormon Environmental Stewardship
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Thanks for sharing and inviting me to the symposium.
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