American Indian Studies
Program Office Hours for Fall 2024
The AIS program office will be open from 8:30-12 noon and from 1-5:30 pm — Monday through Friday.
Monday and Friday office hours will be held remotely. In-person office hours will be on campus (FO-3 308) Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.
Art Neri, the AIS Program Administrative Support Coordinator, is also available via email at art.neri@csulb.edu.
https://vimeo.com/873912057/6d4a7be961?share=copy
CLA Dean Dr. Deborah Thien interviews Professor Emeritus Craig Stone
CSULB Annual Pow Wow 2024
The CSULB Pow Wow will return in march 2024.
Come join us on March 9th and 10th, 2024 for the Annual CSULB Pow Wow at Puvungna. The largest and oldest student sponsored event on campus, our celebration of life is attended by the CSULB American Indian community, alumni, staff, students, faculty, the general public, dancers, singers and venders who make up the over six-thousand people who attend our annual celebration of Native American Culture at “the Beach.” Please check back soon for more information.
Welcome Dr. Thomas Reed
This semester we are very pleased to welcome Dr. Thomas Reed, new tenure track professor in American Indian Studies. The College of Liberal Arts magazine, Aspire has a feature article profile about Dr. Reed at the link below.
Welcome Dr. Kimberly Robertson
In spring semester 2022 we were very pleased to welcome Dr. Kimberly Robertson as the first person to be hired as an Associate Professor of American Indian Studies at CSULB. Dr. Robertson brings a wealth of experience in American Indian Studies and Women and Gender Studies as an outstanding educational leader, teacher, scholar and artist/cultural producer. The College of Liberal Arts webpage has a feature article profile about Dr. Robertson at the link below.
The AIS Faculty
Dr. Robertson joins our two other full-time faculty, Assistant Professor, Dr. Theresa Gregor and full-time lecturer/NAGPRA Coordinator Cindy Alvitre along with our thirteen part-time lecturers and our FERP (half-time) AIS Program Director, Professor Emeritus Craig Stone. Check out the faculty page https://cla.csulb.edu/departments/americanindianstudies/ais-faculty/ to learn more about the American Indian Studies Faculty.
AIS faculty and author Cindi Alvitre receives the 2021 award from the Children’s Literature Council of Southern California in the category of Excellence in Picture Book of Cultural Significance.
AIS faculty and new tribal leader Heidi Lucero in a renewed fight to gain federal recognition for The Juaneño Band of Mission Indians.
Latest Updates on our Response to COVID-19
https://www.csulb.edu/covid-19
Welcome to American Indian Studies
Welcome back to Cal State Puvungna (CSULB) for the Fall 2021 semester. Most of the AIS courses this semester will be offered on-line with face-to-face instruction being offered in our LBESI dual-enrollment courses that we teach at high schools in three local school districts. This means that faculty office hours for on-line courses will be on-line again this semester with the exception of LBESI courses in the high schools.
If you have any questions please feel free to contact us via email.
Craig Stone, Program Director – craig.stone@csulb.edu
Art Neri, Administrative Support Coordinator – art.neri@csulb.edu
Theresa Gregor, Associate Professor – theresa.gregor@csulb.edu
Thomas Reed, Assistant Professor – thomas.reed@csulb.edu
Kimberly Robertson, Associate Professor – kimberly.robertson@csulb.edu
Kelly Stewart, Assistant Professor – kelly.stewart@csulb.edu
Cindi Alvitre – cindy.alvitre@csulb.edu
Adelita Arredondo – adelita.arredondo@csulb.edu
Daniele Bolelli – daniele.bolelli@csulb.edu
Farrah Ferris – ferrah.ferris@csulb.edu
Bruce Gomez – bruce.gomez@csulb.edu
Kevin Hale – kevin.hale@csulb.edu
Kathy Leonard – kathy.leonard@csulb.edu
Heidi Lucero – heidi.lucero@csulb.edu
Taylor Maki – taylor.maki@csulb.edu
Harrelson Notah – harrelson.notah@csulb.edu
Anna H. Nazarian-Peters – anna.nazarian@csulb.edu
Les Peters – les.peters@csulb.edu
Jacob Pratt – jacob.pratt@csulb.edu
Rebecca Sanchez – rebecca.sanchez@csulb.edu
Judge Deborah Sanchez – deborah.sanchez@csulb.edu
Brandon Silva – brandon.silva@csulb.edu
Moira West — moira.west@csulb.edu
Vincent Whipple – vincent.whipple@csulb.edu
Lola Worthington — Lola.worthington@csulb.edu
Any Inquiries that require immediate assistance, please visit
The College of Liberal Arts Offices (CLA Building) or call 562.985.5381
The American Indian Studies Program Update
The New CSU Ethnic Studies Requirement, General Education, Category F
The California State University System is now requiring that students take an Ethnic Studies course as part of their General Education requirements to graduate from the CSU. This is required of incoming freshman and transfer students beginning this Fall 2021 semester. To meet the demand for new courses that meet this requirement at CSULB, we have been busy this past year and over the summer developing two courses being offered this semester.
The lower division course is AIS 119 – Introduction to Racial and Ethnic Studies and the upper division course is AIS 319 – Racial and Ethnic Studies in the United States. Both courses are comparative ethnic studies courses where students learn about the four racialized groups in the United States as defined in California Law AB-1460, American Indian, African American, Asian American and Chicano(a)/Latinx. The goal at CSULB is to provide instruction about all four of these racialized groups in the United States in each of the courses we teach to meet the new requirement.
These courses are offered by all the four Ethic Studies disciplines at CSULB which are among the oldest Ethnic Studies departments and programs in the CSU. Founded in response to student demand, the California State University System created the first Ethnic Studies courses, programs, departments and a College of Ethnic Studies in the late 1960s and is now the first major university system to develop an Ethnic Studies graduation requirement. The American Indian Studies Program at CSULB is fifty-three years old, the oldest American Indian Studies Program in the CSU System.
The Increasing Value of an American Indian Studies Minor or Certificate
The Minor and Certificate offered at CSULB in the American Indian Studies Program have become especially valuable to faculty seeking to be hired to teach these new required ethnic studies courses. Having a minor, certificate or degree in American Indian Studies has been a major factor in hiring instructors to teach these new comparative ethnic studies courses in American Indian Studies.
New Demand for Ethnic Studies Educators
With the increased demand for Ethnic Studies Professors at the university level to meet this new requirement in the CSU, we are also seeing an increased demand for qualified Ethnic Studies teachers in Community Colleges in California who recently passed an Ethnic Studies requirement as a graduation requirement. In addition, school districts in California are now required by state law to teach ethnic studies courses, increasing the demand for even more qualified teachers in American Indian Studies.
With the new growing demand for qualified Ethnic Studies educators, students should seriously consider adding the Minor in Native American Cultures or the Certificate in American Indian Studies and Indigenous Studies to be more competitive and employable when they graduate. Most students can graduate on time while earning a Minor in Native American Cultures and a Bachelor’s degree at CSULB.
Contact Craig Stone at Craig.Stone@csulb.edu for more information. And the ATLAS team at https://cla.csulb.edu/atlas/ to declare your minor or certificate.
I Appreciate and Respect You
To reaffirm our appreciation and respect for all languages spoken at CSULB, we created a “Linguistic Landscaping project,” that uses language in virtual and real public space on campus. This is the first project of, The Puvungna Arts Empathy Production Project. An ongoing project that focuses on ways to foster “empathy production” that grew out of the recommendations of the Report on the Advancement of Ethnic Studies in the CSU.
Translation: I appreciate and respect you in the Šmuwič Chumash Language
Translated by AIS faculty member, Judge Deborah Sanchez, this is one of first of many videos translating the phrase, I appreciate and respect you, into the languages that are spoken by members of the CSULB community. Signs are placed on campus with a QR code that one is able to scan with your phone linking you to videos like the one above where you can hear or see the phrase pronounced/signed in each language
The goal of the project is to encourage learning more about our own diversity on campus and to stimulate empathy for others in the process. We also appreciate and acknowledge that California has been the most culturally and linguistically diverse area of North America for thousands of years. To learn more about how you can participate in this project click the link below.
Link to Other Languages At CSULB
CSULB Press Releases Regarding 49-er Mascot Removal
https://www.csulb.edu/mascot
https://www.csulb.edu/news/article/students-select-the-shark-as-new-mascot
https://daily49er.com/news/2020/06/26/prospector-pete-statue-removed-from-campus/
https://daily49er.com/news/2018/09/11/lbsu-opts-to-move-prospector-pete-statue-and-get-a-new-mascot/
