The Indigenous Revolt: Carlisle, PA and Beyond

Dr. Mandy Cheromiah (Ka'ow'dthu'ee), Executive Director of the Jim Thorpe Center for the Futures of Native Peoples at Dickinson College, reflects on two years of living, working, and praying in Carlisle, Penna. She moved from Alaska to Carlisle on May 13, 2024, and began her work on May 20, 2024. Through stories filled with love, thanksgiving, grief, heartache, laughter, and responsibi...

Chronicles of Carlisle is a short story series from the Indigenous Revolt Podcast featuring Dr. Hero Juice, Amanda Cheromiah (Laguna Pueblo), and Big C, Carissa Brownotter (Diné/Lakota). Full of humor, honesty, and laughter, these stories reflect the everyday reality of living, working, and praying in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, a place that can feel both deeply meaningful and completely surreal. As I...

In this episode of The Indigenous Revolt: Carlisle, PA, and Beyond, Dr. Karen Francis-Begay (Diné) brings the wisdom of more than 30 years in higher education and a decades-long relationship with Dr. Amanda Cheromiah (Laguna Pueblo) that began in 2004 in Tucson at the University of Arizona. A close relative and longtime mentor, she shares insight on leadership, mentorship, and what it means to nav...

Indigenous Excellence is an episode of The Indigenous Revolt that centers the voice of Dr. Linda Tuhiwai Smith (Ngāti Awa and Ngāti Porou, Māori), one of the most influential Indigenous scholars and educators of our time. With her permission, this episode features her keynote from the 2025 World Indigenous Peoples Conference on Education (WIPCE) in Auckland, Aotearoa. WIPCE brought together 3,800...

Dickinson College Center for the Futures of Native Peoples (CFNP) held a Ground Blessing on November 8, 2024, marking an important beginning. In this episode, Trini, a Dickinson College student, Anna Nasser '25, and Ashley Ott, members of the local CFNP Advisory Board, reflect on their roles in helping host the Ceremony. They share what it means to support this moment, to be invited into Indig...

In Their Dreams Are True , IndigenousRelatives who helped host the November 8, 2025, Ground Blessing at Dickinson College share their reflections on a Ceremony offered to set the land in a good way for the future Jim Thorpe Center for the Futures of Native Peoples. Mary Thorpe (Sac and Fox, Absentee Shawnee,Prairie Band Potawatomi, and Kansas Kickapoo); Alejandro Higuera (Pascua Yaqui); Lynette St...

At Dickinson College in Carlisle, Penna., we are witnessing a profound moment: the unveiling of the Jim Thorpe Center for the Futures of Native Peoples rising just a mile from the grounds of the former Carlisle Indian Industrial School. This space will center Indigenous knowledge-keepers, ceremony, art, healing, and scholarly inquiry, a place built on our stories, our communities, and our futures....

Recorded in Oklahoma, Grandma Dr. Henrietta Mann (Southern Cheyenne) shares heartfelt words for those who have taken part in repatriation ceremonies connected to the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, PA, and for all who continue the journey of care, remembrance, and return. Recorded on October 8, 2025 Photo by Rachel Valdez

Grandma Dr. Henrietta Verle Mann (Southern Cheyenne) speaks loving words to Our People in this special podcast episode. If you are having a tough day or navigating challenges, save this episode — her voice and presence will encourage and uplift you. Dr. Mann is a respected Native scholar, educator, and activist who has dedicated more than 40 years to advancing Native American higher education. Bor...

Dr. Ka'ow'dthu'ee sits down with Dr. Michael Kotutwa Johnson (Hopi) during his first visit to Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where he spoke at Dickinson College’s Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues. Dr. Johnson shares the brilliance of Hopi dryland farming and reflects on the responsibility to carry forward ancestral knowledge. Their conversation explores Indigenous ingenuity—how traditiona...

In this episode of The Indigenous Revolt , Dr.  Ka'ow'dthu'ee shares a personal journey from Carlisle to Gila River, witnessing President Joe Biden deliver a historic apology for the federal Indian boarding school policy. The episode begins on October 24, 2024, traveling from Harrisburg International Airport in Pennsylvania to Phoenix, Arizona, tracing the movement from the site of the...

What might our ancestors have said, if they’d been given the chance to speakfreely? I’m Dr. Ka’ow’dthu’ee, your host of the Indigenous Revolt podcast. I’vespent over 14 months living, working, and praying in Carlisle,Pennsylvania—about a mile from the site of the former Carlisle Indian Industrial School.   This season of The Indigenous Revolt is made up of recordings I’ve gathered over the past ye...

In this episode, Dr. Amanda Cheromiah offers an unfiltered reflection on her first eight months living and working in Carlisle, Pennsylvania—the former site of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School. Through 20 personal and communal observations, she traces what it means to carry out Indigenous-centered work in a place shaped by historical trauma and ongoing presence. From healing ceremonies, stude...

In this special episode, Dr. Amanda Cheromiah sits with two of the inaugural Student Advisory Fellows for the Center for the Futures of Native Peoples. Kanoa Hunter (Native Hawaiian), a graduating senior majoring in History, and Alex Kluge (German), an international student studying English-Speaking Cultures, reflect on their time at Dickinson College, their experiences with CFNP, and what it mean...

John Truden earned his PhD inUS History from the University of Oklahoma. His first book- currently under review at the University of Nebraska Press - explores Indigenous-settler relationships in Oklahoma, Texas, and Kansas between Reconstruction and the Red Power era. His second book will examine Native America during the 1970s. He has published in both academic journals - notably the  Western His...

Lynette Stant, a member of the Dine’ Nation, is a distinguished educator with over two decades of experience in elementary education. Currently, she teaches third grade on the Salt River Indian Reservation in Scottsdale, Arizona, where her deep-rooted commitment to student success and cultural empowerment drives her pedagogical approach. Lynette holds a Master’s degree from Grand Canyon University...

Kate Theimer is a Project Partner with the Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, focusing on cataloging photographs and authority control of student names. She also hosts the Carlisle Indian School Research podcast and is the author of A Very Correct Idea of Our School”: A Photographic History of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School (2018).  Since 2004, Kate has been a Fellow of the Soc...

On November 17, 2024, in Carlisle, PA, the Carlisle Town Band performed a program featuring music connected to the Carlisle Indian Industrial School (operated from 1879 to 1918). As Band Director Dave Rohrer explains in this recording, the concert included four pieces—two originally played by the Carlisle Indian School Band and two composed by Dennison Wheelock, a former student and Band Master at...

Barbara Landis is the retired Carlisle Indian Industrial School Archives and Library Specialist for the Cumberland County Historical Society in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. She has worked closely with individuals and nations to develop biographical and research resources for www. CarlisleIndianSchool.org . Landis encourages those studying Carlisle to acknowledge descendants' complex and varied resp...

Jim Gerencser is the Associate Dean for Archives and Special Collections at Dickinson College in Carlisle, PA and also Director of the Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center. He holds an MLS from the University of Pittsburgh and an MA in History from Shippensburg University. With 25 years of experience managing digital projects at Dickinson, Jim is focused on making primary sources easily...

In December 2024, Dr. Ka-ow-dthu-ee (Amanda Cheromiah) and Chief Phillip Whiteman, Jr., both descendants of the Carlisle Indian School, walk the living grounds of the former Carlisle Indian Industrial School. What they encounter is not a memory of the past but the undeniable presence of Ancestors whose voices, energy, and strength continue to shape the world today. As they walk, they give an offer...

Gerilyn is the Great Granddaughter of Indian Boarding School Survivor, Tom Torlino. Torlino’s iconic image is a widely used photograph from a 1880’s postcard from the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania. Tom Torlino returned to New Mexico and worked as a Navajo Scout/Interpreter and Medicine Man. Gerilyn has independently researched and has documented the Torlino/Tolino family histor...

Joannie Marie Suina (Pueblo de Cochiti), Ed. D, earned a Doctorate of Education in Educational Leadership from the University of Washington in 2023. Her academic pursuits are deeply rooted in uplifting the ongoing healing endeavors spearheaded by Native American communities.  Suina's educational background is extensive, reflecting her commitment to the humanities and global advocacy. She holds...

Dr. Amanda Cheromiah reflects on her experience touring the historic grounds of the former Carlisle Indian Industrial School, this time learning and connecting in a way she never has before. Walking the same paths her Relatives once walked while the school was in operation, she is joined by her mentors, Jim Gerencser and Kate Theimer, whose dedication to archiving and preserving the stories of Car...

Dr. Chris Nelson (Diné/Laguna Pueblo – she/her/hers) is an Associate Professor at the University of Denver – Morgridge College of Education. As an Indigenous woman at a predominantly white university, she has learned the importance of storying to navigate settler educational systems. In her session, she will share how she connects concepts of land and non-humans beings to deepen her intentions whe...