Dr. Joseph Dupris joins Brown University this year as NAISI visiting faculty also affiliated with American Studies. He is a citizen of the Klamath Tribes (Klamath, Modoc, and Yahooskin Paiute whose homelands span southern Oregon and northern California). He is also of Big Pine Paiute and Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe ancestry. Dupris received a joint Ph.D. in Anthropology and Linguistics and M.A. in Linguistics - Native American Linguistics and Languages (NAMA) emphasis - from the University of Arizona. His doctoral research addresses issues around tribal language research with a focus on sustaining tribal polities through critical analyses of language, race, and nation. Dupris recently served as a Visiting Assistant Professor in Linguistics and Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado Boulder focusing on Native American and Indigenous Linguistics. The focus grounds language research in the epistemologies and lived experience of tribal peoples that use tributary knowledge from western linguistic inquiry while acknowledging the indigenizing, racializing, and minoritizing processes associated therein. This work aligns Dupris with broader capacity-building efforts across the linguistic sciences, such as those of Natives4Linguistics. Dupris is now collaborating with Modoc Nation, a sister tribe of Modoc who were exiled to Indian Territory 150 years ago, to establish critical language infrastructures in northeast Oklahoma. His hope is to help the Klamath Tribes and Modoc Nation work cooperatively through the UNESCO International Decade of Indigenous Languages 2022-2032 while developing a critical understanding of the political-legal histories that resulted in the outlaw, curtailment of their respective tribal languages. Dupris will teach four courses in Native American and Indigenous Studies at Brown.

Dr. Meg Harvey completed her Ph.D. in Linguistics from the University of Arizona this year and joins NAISI as a postdoctoral research associate for the 2023-24 academic year. Meg's research focuses on language revitalization, with a particular interest in the ways documenting the process of revitalization can support language teaching and learning. Beyond this, she works on the morphology-phonology interface, with specific areas of interest in Mayan languages and languages of Mesoamerica. In addition to her work with the Tunica-Biloxi tribe and serving as a linguist for the tribe’s Language and Culture Revitalization program, Meg has worked with the Uspanteko community in the highlands of Guatemala and the Hiaki language and community in southern Arizona. In addition to English and French, Dr. Harvey also has varying degrees of knowledge in Tunica, Uspanteko, Hiaki, Kaqchikel, Tohono O’odham, Classical Nahuatl, Seri and Spanish. She will contribute two courses this year to the growing NAIS curriculum.

Honor Keeler, J.D., is a citizen of Cherokee Nation who is joining our NAISI faculty as a Visiting Professor of Practice. She is a legal scholar and author who has worked globally with Indigenous nations to protect their sacred places and ensure the return of Indigenous ancestors and cultural items. Keeler worked for over a decade as a partner investigator on several grants based at The Australian National University (ANU) to support the work of the Return, Reconcile, Renew (RRR) Network and repatriation project, and now sits on the RRR Archive Governance Board. She also serves on the Advisory Council of the Association of Tribal Archives, Libraries, and Museums (ATALM). Keeler is the former Assistant Director of Utah Diné Bikéyah, an Indigenous nonprofit focused on the protection of the Bears Ears traditional and sacred lands. She recently ended a term on the NAGPRA Review Committee (2018-2022) and as Vice President of the Board of Trustees at the Cherokee National Historical Society. Keeler previously was a Visiting Assistant Professor at Wesleyan University and has worked for national organizations, such as the American Indian Law Center, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, and the Association on American Indian Affairs (AAIA). Her scholarship and research interests focus on Indigenous human rights, the rights of Indigenous women, sacred places and environmental protection, repatriation, Indigenous entrepreneurship, and Cherokee studies. Keeler is completing her Ph.D. in Interdisciplinary and Cross-Cultural Research (ICCR) at the College of Arts and Social Sciences at The Australian National University (ANU). She holds a J.D. and Indian Law Certificate from the University of New Mexico School of Law, completed her undergraduate degree in Anthropology at Brown University (‘05), and is a former president and Executive Committee founding member of Native Americans at Brown Alumni (NABA). She will offer four courses focused on federal Indian law and Indigenous human rights.

Eric Johnson is Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in Native American and Indigenous Art and Architecture in the Department of History of Art and Architecture, the Native American and Indigenous Studies Initiative and the Cogut Institute for the Humanities. Eric Johnson's research combines archaeological and historical methods to examine intersecting effects of colonialism and capitalism in North America, specifically northern New Jersey. 

Mack Scott is a historian, educator, and member of the Narragansett Indian Tribe. His work focuses on the intersections of race and identity and employs agency as a lens through which to view and understand the voices, stories, and perspectives of traditionally marginalized peoples.