Many Indigenous writers recognize that traditional Indigenous knowledge and ways of being are embedded in tribal languages, and they have built their languages into their poetic process. In a time of conflict, climate change, and grief, heritage languages guide Indigenous nations in both how to navigate crisis and how to remain accountable to the people and places that claim them.

In this event co-sponsored by the Association of Writers & Writing Programs, a panel of Indigenous Nations Poets talks about how active engagement with Indigenous languages enacts a process of reciprocity – a giving back of the language gifts of song and teachings to Native relatives and to other communities.

Elise Paschen (Osage), author of five poetry collections and co-editor of the New York Times' bestseller Poetry Speaks, moderates a panel conversation and reading with three poets about how languages inform a “poetics of reciprocity” both on the page and in their roles as teachers, mentors, leaders, and activists.

Heid E. Erdrich’s (Ojibwe) poetry collection Little Big Bully won a National Poetry Series award and the Babbit prize from The Library of Congress; Jake Skeets (Diné) is author of Eyes Bottle Dark with a Mouthful of Flowers and winner of the National Poetry Series, Kate Tufts Discovery Award, American Book Award, and Whiting Award; and Kimberly Blaeser (Anishinaabe), past Wisconsin poet laureate and founding director of Indigenous Nations Poets, is the author of six poetry collections, most recently Ancient Light.