Joanne Barker facts for kids
Joanne Barker (Lenape, citizen of the Delaware Tribe of Indians) became a faculty member within the American Indian Studies Department at San Francisco State University, in 2003. Much of her work focuses on indigenous feminism and the sovereignty and self determination of indigenous peoples. Her work takes a transnational approach, making connections between and across the borders of countries. Barker makes historical and scholarly connections between the oppression and resistance of marginalized communities. An example of this transnational approach can be seen by the work that Barker has done to show connections in the struggles of Palestinians in Israel and indigenous communities in the United States.
Education and career
Joanne Barker received her PhD in the History of Consciousness Department from the University of California, Santa Cruz, in 2000 where she specialized in indigenous jurisprudence, women's/gender studies, and cultural studies. Barker is a professor of American Indian Studies at San Francisco State University.
Activism
In her work as an advocate for Native Americans, Barker has drawn connections between the oppression of Native American communities in the United States of America and Palestinians. She began drawing parallels between the two groups of peoples after a 2014 delegation trip to Israel. Barker wrote that Palestinian activist Leila Khaled "defined solidarity as a strategy of connecting struggles of the people in the U.S. against U.S. imperialism and colonialism to the struggles of Palestinians against Israel". Barker also advocates for cultural repatriation rights, human rights, anti-war politics, and environmental issues. With environmental issues, Barker specifically focused on energy policies and conservation issues in relation to indigenous tribes in California. She covers some of her advocacy in her blog, Tequila Sovereign, where she also discusses current events, her scholarship, and artwork.
Awards
- Rockefeller Foundation Humanities Fellowship
- Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship (2005-2006)
