Youth writing workshop amplifies missing and murdered Indigenous relatives
Later this month, community members in Bemidji are planning to gather to search for Nevaeh Kingbird, who went missing nearly two years ago at the age of 15. Hers is one of many cases where Indigenous women and girls have disappeared in Minnesota.
Between 27 and 54 were missing in any given month from 2012 through 2020. That’s according to data from the state Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives Office. The stories of those who went missing weigh heavily on friends, loved ones and others who worry about their own safety.
The Minneapolis organization MIGIZI is bringing together Native American youth to process their connection to this issue through writing. The first round of the program wrapped up in March and the second is scheduled to begin this month.
MIGIZI’s Lead Media Instructor, Binesikwe Means and a participant in the MIGIZI Speaks program, Kija Dear joined MPR News host Cathy Wurzer.
Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation.
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Audio transcript
INTERVIEWER: Later this month, community members in Bemidji plan to search for Nevaeh Kingbird who went missing nearly two years ago at the age of 15. Hers is one of many cases where Indigenous women and girls have disappeared in Minnesota. Between 27 and 54 were missing in any given month, from 2012 through 2020. That's according to figures from the state Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives Office.
The stories of those who went missing weigh heavily on friends, loved ones, and others who worry about their own safety. The Minneapolis organization MIGIZI is bringing together Native American youth to process their connection to this issue through writing. The first round of the program wrapped up in March. The second is scheduled to begin this month, on September 17.
Joining us right now is MIGIZI lead media instructor Binesikwe Means and a participant in the MIGIZI Speaks program Kaya Deer. Welcome to both of you.
BINESIKWE MEANS: Thank you for having us.
KAYA DEER: Hello.
INTERVIEWER: Thank you for being here. I really appreciate your time. Binesikwe, I'm going to start with you.
I know you were approached by the National Youth poet laureate Amanda Gorman, who is an amazing person, about this project. That's pretty exciting. How did it all come about?
BINESIKWE MEANS: Well, Amanda Gorman approached us as an organization when she was developing her Writing for Change initiative. We were just really proud to be a part of it. We weren't sure exactly how she heard about our organization, but she was the one that recommended that we apply for the grant to establish a program like MIGIZI Speaks.
INTERVIEWER: So did you design the writing prompts?
BINESIKWE MEANS: Yes. I worked with my co-facilitator whose name is Jamela Pettiford, and we came together and developed these writing prompts. For myself, I work in media, and so a lot of my programming happens in front of a computer. Right? We're editing photos. We're editing video. And it was really beautiful to take the opportunity to strip all of that away and give our students a pen and a piece of paper and lead them with these writing prompts, where we talked about our community and women in our community, safety, and things like that.
INTERVIEWER: Kaya, what was it like for you to be able to sit down and just write your thoughts, bare your soul really to the world, if you think about it?
KAYA DEER: It feel good Jamela and Bine, she really established this safe and warm environment. And getting these prompts and writing them down, some of them were very really confronting your own secrets and trying to make sense of why you do things that aren't healthy. It was just very introspective.
INTERVIEWER: Can I ask you, what role does writing play in your life?
KAYA DEER: I like writing. I want to be a writer and write for like either books or screenplays. So my writing was usually about just stories. So I never really took a deeper dive into my own thoughts and feelings, until I joined.
INTERVIEWER: I'm glad you had the opportunity to do that. Binesikwe, can I ask you about some of the prompts? Outline some of what the girls were writing from.
BINESIKWE MEANS: Sure. We did writing prompts like the power of my bloodline, where students talked about attributes that they got from both their mother and their father. Whether it was physical or mental, spiritual, what were some of the gifts that your parents gave you? We also did a writing prompt called Miss Sneaky, where we were asking the girls to be honest about who they are when nobody's around. Right? A lot of our young women in our community are a part of this online culture. We just wanted to make sure that they were being as honest and as safe as possible, when exploring and going through this digital age.
We did some investigations into murdered, missing Indigenous relatives profiles. So we found a website, looked up some of the cases, and spoke about them. We were able to find cases of women from 42 years old all the way down to 4 years old, cases that were never solved and women that are still missing from our community. And it was a powerful piece to do, just because it really made our students realize that there are only one or two people away from a missing relative.
INTERVIEWER: Say, Kaya, do you have a relative who's missing? Did that hit home to you?
KAYA DEER: I remember my aunt. She was missing for about a month or two, and we were worried about her, like obviously, we'd be worried about her. And we had like no help from nobody, but luckily, she was-- she was found. I'm glad that she came back safe, but those two months where she was gone and we had like nothing from her were scary.
INTERVIEWER: What was it like for you to talk about some of these difficult subjects through the writing prompts?
KAYA DEER: It was hard. There was moments where we would all just be sitting together, crying, because of how real everything is and how any of us in that room could become a missing person.
INTERVIEWER: I want to play a little bit of a poem. This is a poem that's read by one of the participants named Nova, and this poem is called "I will find you." Let's listen.
NOVA: I will find you. Your voice was taken, but I'll get it back. I will find you, so your family can see your shining eyes once again. I will find you, so your friends will hear your beautiful laugh.
I will find you, because you're important. You deserve a chance to live, a chance without people who will take advantage of you and steal your voice. I will find you.
INTERVIEWER: Binesikwe, what was the writing prompt that led to that poem?
BINESIKWE MEANS: We were writing letters to the young women whose profiles we went through and looked at, did a small investigation of our own into their case files. And Nova's writing prompt was to write a letter to the woman. If she was to be standing in front of you, how would you speak to her, and how would you go about this conversation of how do you find her?
INTERVIEWER: That is powerful. Wow. For folks who may have heard me mention that this is MIGIZI, this program is through MIGIZI, that name might sound familiar. MIGIZI was a, gosh, a news radio program, back in the 1970s, and it grew, thanks to the hard work of the late Laura Waterman Wittstock, who was an amazing person.
And I understand you're going back into the archives, which I'm sure there's just a ton of great content in those archives. And you're using some of the old tape for this new round of workshops. Is that right?
BINESIKWE MEANS: Yeah. We're really excited. We digitized, and now we are transcribing our radio show, First Person Radio, where we had tapes that date back to 1965. So it will be really beautiful for our students to get the opportunity to look at what community was going through then and what community is going through now.
INTERVIEWER: Wow. I bet there was some really interesting archival audio that you came across.
BINESIKWE MEANS: Yeah, for sure. We have a lot of poets. Like John Trudell was a host many of times. My uncle Russell Means was a host a few times. We're just really proud of our archive, and I think it really speaks to the beautiful work of our founders in that we were able to digitize these tapes, and the sound quality, everything is beautiful, and we're really excited about the work that they've done and the work that we're going to create in the future.
INTERVIEWER: I will end this conversation by asking you, once this second round starts, the new workshop, are you doing anything differently this time around?
BINESIKWE MEANS: The difference between our first session and our second session is we're really excited to include our two-spirited relatives, as well as bring young men into this conversation. Because we realize that it doesn't just happen to the women in our community, but also our two-spirited relatives and young men. If we're talking about protecting young women, we're hoping to include young men, so that they can have a seat at this table. So that it's not just women worrying about protecting themselves, but men also actively taking part in protecting our women and protecting our communities.
INTERVIEWER: I appreciate the time that both of you took to talk with us. Thank you so much, and best of luck.
BINESIKWE MEANS: Yeah. Thank you for having us.
KAYA DEER: Yes. It was great talking to you.
INTERVIEWER: MIGIZI Lead Media Instructor Binesikwe Means and Kaya Deer.
The stories of those who went missing weigh heavily on friends, loved ones, and others who worry about their own safety. The Minneapolis organization MIGIZI is bringing together Native American youth to process their connection to this issue through writing. The first round of the program wrapped up in March. The second is scheduled to begin this month, on September 17.
Joining us right now is MIGIZI lead media instructor Binesikwe Means and a participant in the MIGIZI Speaks program Kaya Deer. Welcome to both of you.
BINESIKWE MEANS: Thank you for having us.
KAYA DEER: Hello.
INTERVIEWER: Thank you for being here. I really appreciate your time. Binesikwe, I'm going to start with you.
I know you were approached by the National Youth poet laureate Amanda Gorman, who is an amazing person, about this project. That's pretty exciting. How did it all come about?
BINESIKWE MEANS: Well, Amanda Gorman approached us as an organization when she was developing her Writing for Change initiative. We were just really proud to be a part of it. We weren't sure exactly how she heard about our organization, but she was the one that recommended that we apply for the grant to establish a program like MIGIZI Speaks.
INTERVIEWER: So did you design the writing prompts?
BINESIKWE MEANS: Yes. I worked with my co-facilitator whose name is Jamela Pettiford, and we came together and developed these writing prompts. For myself, I work in media, and so a lot of my programming happens in front of a computer. Right? We're editing photos. We're editing video. And it was really beautiful to take the opportunity to strip all of that away and give our students a pen and a piece of paper and lead them with these writing prompts, where we talked about our community and women in our community, safety, and things like that.
INTERVIEWER: Kaya, what was it like for you to be able to sit down and just write your thoughts, bare your soul really to the world, if you think about it?
KAYA DEER: It feel good Jamela and Bine, she really established this safe and warm environment. And getting these prompts and writing them down, some of them were very really confronting your own secrets and trying to make sense of why you do things that aren't healthy. It was just very introspective.
INTERVIEWER: Can I ask you, what role does writing play in your life?
KAYA DEER: I like writing. I want to be a writer and write for like either books or screenplays. So my writing was usually about just stories. So I never really took a deeper dive into my own thoughts and feelings, until I joined.
INTERVIEWER: I'm glad you had the opportunity to do that. Binesikwe, can I ask you about some of the prompts? Outline some of what the girls were writing from.
BINESIKWE MEANS: Sure. We did writing prompts like the power of my bloodline, where students talked about attributes that they got from both their mother and their father. Whether it was physical or mental, spiritual, what were some of the gifts that your parents gave you? We also did a writing prompt called Miss Sneaky, where we were asking the girls to be honest about who they are when nobody's around. Right? A lot of our young women in our community are a part of this online culture. We just wanted to make sure that they were being as honest and as safe as possible, when exploring and going through this digital age.
We did some investigations into murdered, missing Indigenous relatives profiles. So we found a website, looked up some of the cases, and spoke about them. We were able to find cases of women from 42 years old all the way down to 4 years old, cases that were never solved and women that are still missing from our community. And it was a powerful piece to do, just because it really made our students realize that there are only one or two people away from a missing relative.
INTERVIEWER: Say, Kaya, do you have a relative who's missing? Did that hit home to you?
KAYA DEER: I remember my aunt. She was missing for about a month or two, and we were worried about her, like obviously, we'd be worried about her. And we had like no help from nobody, but luckily, she was-- she was found. I'm glad that she came back safe, but those two months where she was gone and we had like nothing from her were scary.
INTERVIEWER: What was it like for you to talk about some of these difficult subjects through the writing prompts?
KAYA DEER: It was hard. There was moments where we would all just be sitting together, crying, because of how real everything is and how any of us in that room could become a missing person.
INTERVIEWER: I want to play a little bit of a poem. This is a poem that's read by one of the participants named Nova, and this poem is called "I will find you." Let's listen.
NOVA: I will find you. Your voice was taken, but I'll get it back. I will find you, so your family can see your shining eyes once again. I will find you, so your friends will hear your beautiful laugh.
I will find you, because you're important. You deserve a chance to live, a chance without people who will take advantage of you and steal your voice. I will find you.
INTERVIEWER: Binesikwe, what was the writing prompt that led to that poem?
BINESIKWE MEANS: We were writing letters to the young women whose profiles we went through and looked at, did a small investigation of our own into their case files. And Nova's writing prompt was to write a letter to the woman. If she was to be standing in front of you, how would you speak to her, and how would you go about this conversation of how do you find her?
INTERVIEWER: That is powerful. Wow. For folks who may have heard me mention that this is MIGIZI, this program is through MIGIZI, that name might sound familiar. MIGIZI was a, gosh, a news radio program, back in the 1970s, and it grew, thanks to the hard work of the late Laura Waterman Wittstock, who was an amazing person.
And I understand you're going back into the archives, which I'm sure there's just a ton of great content in those archives. And you're using some of the old tape for this new round of workshops. Is that right?
BINESIKWE MEANS: Yeah. We're really excited. We digitized, and now we are transcribing our radio show, First Person Radio, where we had tapes that date back to 1965. So it will be really beautiful for our students to get the opportunity to look at what community was going through then and what community is going through now.
INTERVIEWER: Wow. I bet there was some really interesting archival audio that you came across.
BINESIKWE MEANS: Yeah, for sure. We have a lot of poets. Like John Trudell was a host many of times. My uncle Russell Means was a host a few times. We're just really proud of our archive, and I think it really speaks to the beautiful work of our founders in that we were able to digitize these tapes, and the sound quality, everything is beautiful, and we're really excited about the work that they've done and the work that we're going to create in the future.
INTERVIEWER: I will end this conversation by asking you, once this second round starts, the new workshop, are you doing anything differently this time around?
BINESIKWE MEANS: The difference between our first session and our second session is we're really excited to include our two-spirited relatives, as well as bring young men into this conversation. Because we realize that it doesn't just happen to the women in our community, but also our two-spirited relatives and young men. If we're talking about protecting young women, we're hoping to include young men, so that they can have a seat at this table. So that it's not just women worrying about protecting themselves, but men also actively taking part in protecting our women and protecting our communities.
INTERVIEWER: I appreciate the time that both of you took to talk with us. Thank you so much, and best of luck.
BINESIKWE MEANS: Yeah. Thank you for having us.
KAYA DEER: Yes. It was great talking to you.
INTERVIEWER: MIGIZI Lead Media Instructor Binesikwe Means and Kaya Deer.
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