The statistics are devastating. According to the National Institute of Justice, four out of five American Indian or Alaska Native women have been victims of violence, and over half of Native women have been victims of sexual violence. Some advocates against such violence believe these numbers may even underestimate the severity of the issue.
Trisha Etringer, a member of the Winnebago Tribe living in Sioux City, got involved in advocating for greater awareness of violence against Native and Indigenous women after she found out one of her own aunties had gone missing and was found dead in California.
"I'm a woman, an Indigenous woman at that. And I know that I have a target on my head, basically, anywhere that I go," Etringer says. "It's kind of alarming. We do this work, and you hear from the families and the relatives. You hear about the hurt and the pain, and there's a lot of healing that goes with that. But it's a long, hard road."
On this episode of Talk of Iowa, host Charity Nebbe is joined by three Indigenous women, who are fighting to raise awareness for missing and murdered Indigenous women and relatives, and end the cycle of violence.
This program originally aired on September 11, 2019.
Guests Include:
- Trisha Etringer, member of the Winnebago Tribe and grassroots organizer for Indigenous Iowa
- Christine Nobiss, decolonizer and director of the Seeding Sovereignty SHIFT program
- Marisa Cummings, member of the Omaha Tribe
