Q’ushintul / Walking Together: PeaceMakers’ Gathering and Ancestor Walk

QUIYAHWULTU-HW / ROBERT GEORGE

Qwiyahwultu-hw / Robert George: is known for over a half-century as a member of one of the Quw’utsun Nation families who have held the traditional territory of the Quw’utsun lands / Cowichan Valley – since time immemorial.  He has been a holder of much of the lineage of family responsibility for Ceremony, Hospitality, and Teachings in the wider community of Coast Salish Peoples which is host to the lands of where OUR ECOVILLAGE resides. As an Elder facilitator and holder of sacred space and group process which invites us to all move beyond settler/indigenous relations to an “All My Relations”

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERT YAZZIE

Robert Yazzie is a citizen and Chief Justice Emeritus of the Navajo Nation. He served as Chief Justice, practiced law, and was a district judge. He was formerly the Director of the Diné Policy Institute of Diné College, developing policy using authentic Navajo thinking. He is a visiting professor at the University of New Mexico School of Law, an adjunct professor of the Department of Criminal Justice of Northern Arizona University, and a visiting member of the faculty of the National Judicial College. He recently taught Navajo law at the Crownpoint Institute of Technology.

Robert earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Oberlin College of Ohio and a Juris Doctor degree from the University of New Mexico School of Law. He is a member of the Navajo Nation Bar Association. He is the author of articles and book chapters on many subjects, including Navajo peacemaking, traditional Indian law, and international human rights law. He continues a career devoted to education in formal participation in faculties, lectures, and traditional indigenous law discussions at various venues throughout the world. He has a global audience, and he has frequently visited foreign lands to share his wisdom about traditional indigenous justice and governance.

JUSTICE CHERYL FAIRBANKS

Cheryl Demmert Fairbanks (Tlingit-Tsimshian) is a Senior Policy Advisor for the Native American Budget and Policy Institute, which conducts research, budget and policy analysis, social justice advocacy, and litigation to empower Native American communities to create self-determined and systematic change that will improve their health, education, and economic well-being. Ms. Fairbanks has had a long career in Indian law as an attorney and tribal court of appeals justice. 

Formerly a Partner at Cuddy McCarthy LLP, she had a general practice in Indian law, including tribal-state relations, personnel, tribal courts, peacemaking and family conferencing, mediation, family, school, education, and indigenous law. She recently was in Oregon serving as the Walter R. Echo-Hawk Distinguished Visiting Professor of Law at Lewis and Clark and was a visiting Professor of Law at the University of New Mexico’s Southwest Indian Law Clinic. Ms. Fairbanks was also a partner with the law firm of Roth, VanAmberg, Rogers, Ortiz, Fairbanks & Yepa, LLP, where she specialized in Indian law. She worked as a senior policy analyst with the New Mexico Office of Indian Affairs in the area of state-tribal relations. There, she was instrumental in establishing the Indian Child Welfare Desk, New Mexico Office of Indian Tourism, the University of New Mexico Indian Law Clinic, and the passage of the New Mexico Indian Arts and Crafts Act.

Prior to her law career, she served as a teacher for the Albuquerque Public Schools, Zia Day School, and Administrator for Acomita Day School and the Albuquerque/Santa Fe Indian Schools. Ms. Fairbank was born in Ketchikan, Alaska. 

SETH LENNON NYGUYEN-WEINER