Native American and Indigenous Studies Initiative

Visiting Scholars

The Native American and Indigenous Studies Initiative is joined this year by the following visiting scholars.

  • Tarisa Little

    Postdoctoral Fellow in the Departments of History, Native American and Indigenous Studies Initiative, and the Cogut Institute for the Humanities

    Tarisa Little is Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of History and the Cogut Institute for the Humanities. She is a Settler and works with members of the Wyandot of Anderdon Nation. Her research focuses on Indigenous knowledge and ways of knowing. Her current projects focus on Wendat/Wandat witches and Wendat/Wandat engagement (forced and voluntary) with Western-style schooling. She received her M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Saskatchewan in Canada and was a visiting professor for two years at Colgate University in the Native American Studies Program.

  • Nitana Hicks Greendeer

    Research Interests Culture-based education and culturally appropriate curricular models, language education and Indian Education
  • Laura Pensa

    Presidential Postdoctoral Fellow, Hispanic Studies

    Laura Pensa holds a degree in Anthropology from the Universidad de Buenos Aires and a PhD in Romance Languages and Literature from the University of Michigan, with a focus on Colonial Latin America and Indigenous Studies. She is interested in insurgent Indigenous groups of the South American lowlands, historical writing, critical cartography, and contemporary Latin American literature. She was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Pennsylvania (2023-2024) and is currently a Presidential Postdoctoral Fellow at Brown University (2024-2026).