Guides: MMIW: Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women: Home

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May 5th is MMIW Awareness Day

Choctaw Nation on MMIW: May 5th is MMIW Awareness Day

Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Awareness Day is May 5

By Assistant Chief Jack Austin Jr.
May 1, 2023

Currently, in the United States, there are nearly 23,000 people reported missing from tribal lands. Of those, approximately 700 are reported missing from Oklahoma, according to data from the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs). Let that sink in for a moment. Someone’s daughter, son, husband, wife, brother or sister vanishes without a trace.

It is a daily occurrence with a frequency on tribal lands that is startling, to say the least. Due to the vast area that tribal lands cover, response to missing persons reports can be challenging for law enforcement. For example, federal prosecutors have primary criminal jurisdiction for 70 million acres of tribal lands spanning 200 Native American country territories.

Tackling the epidemic of missing and murdered Native women and girls is an imperative issue that demands mutual respect and collaboration in working together with tribal nations. According to the FBI, approximately 75% of the crimes investigated on tribal lands involve homicide, rape, violent assaults, or child abuse.

On May 5, 2021, through efforts from various Native advocates, tribal leaders, and government officials, President Biden signed the proclamation that May 5 is “Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Awareness Day.” The proclamation is designed to bring awareness to the plight of missing and murdered indigenous victims and shed light on the investigation and apprehension of criminals. It is also a day of hope that missing people may return to their families and continue with their lives.

FACT SHEET: Justice Department Strengthens Efforts to Address the Crisis of Missing or Murdered Indigenous Persons May 5th is MMIP Awareness Day
The Justice Department joins its partners across the federal government, as well as people throughout American Indian and Alaska Native communities, in recognizing May 5 as National Missing or Murdered Indigenous Persons Awareness Day. Responding to the unacceptable levels of violence that have led to the crisis of Missing or Murdered Indigenous Persons (MMIP) is a priority of the Department of Justice every day.
2023 National Week of Action for MMIW
The National Partners Work Group on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW) and the MMIW Family Advisors are organizing a National Week of Action (May 1 - May 7, 2023) to call the nation and the world to action in honor of missing and murdered Indigenous women.

Take action by participating in these virtual events, exploring our list of resources, and organizing additional actions in your communities on and around May 5th. Join us in saying enough is enough. No more stolen sisters.

MMIW News & Updates

'It's at our doorstep, it's in our backyard': How California is addressing the MMIW crisis
In Oct. 2022, the Yurok Tribe held its first policy summit to address the Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women crisis. We spoke with those affected by this issue.
Auli'i Cravalho Made a Powerful Red Carpet Statement at The Power Premiere
With tons of cameras and fans around, a glitzy movie or television premiere is certainly the perfect place to make a bold statement be seen and heard—whether it be a fashion one, or something much bigger. At the premiere of Amazon’s The Power in New York City earlier this week, series star Auli'i Cravalho did both: The actor used her red carpet look to spotlight the growing epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women (MMIW).
MMIW advocate Jamie Gladue says human trafficking in Edmonton concerns us all
(ANNews) – Jamie Gladue, a former pipefitter and former sex worker, a survivor, and now outspoken advocate for the missing and murdered Indigenous women (MMIW) in Edmonton, opens up about her battle with substance abuse and Edmonton’s human trafficking ring(s).

She says, “Wake up, Edmonton, there is a huge sex trafficking ring [here]. Multiple rings are operating in Edmonton, and Edmonton is not what it seems; there are many people involved and people you wouldn’t even think of.”
NIWRC Updates MMIW State Legislative Tracker
The new Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW) State Legislative Tracker is a navigational database offered by NIWRC to assist the national movement in monitoring and understanding pending local legislation addressing the crisis of MMIW.
VIDEO: Reno Women’s March draws hundreds to downtown
Hundreds gathered Saturday in downtown Reno to celebrate women. Led by women from area Native American tribes, the annual Reno Women’s March began at the downtown federal courthouse and headed north on Virginia Street to City Plaza.
Wisconsin tribal leader calls for action on public health
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The leader of a northeastern Wisconsin tribe implored lawmakers on Tuesday to do more to address threats to public health and safety that disproportionately affect Native Americans.

Robert VanZile, chairman of the Sokaogon Chippewa Community, called for actions to increase access to health care on tribal lands, fight pollution and end violence against Native American women as he delivered the annual State of the Tribes address to a joint session of the Wisconsin Legislature.

In the Spotlight: MMIW

MMIW: Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women

The US declared May 5, 2018, as a national day of awareness in order to raise concern for the crisis, and refocus attention on issues affecting Indigenous women.

What is the MMIW Movement (WEARENATIVE)? MMIW stands for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women. It’s a movement that advocates for the end of violence against Native women. It also seeks to draw attention to the high rates of disappearances and murders of Native people, particularly women and girls.

Here is a snapshot of data for MMIW in 2018:

About 4 out of 5 Native women have experienced violence
Native women were about twice as likely than white women to experience violence
Native women face murder rates 10 times the national average
The murder rate for Native women is about 3 times more than that of white women

Online Resources

Bklyn Public Library: MMIW
The effects of human rights violations ripple through history. Even today, through the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons (“MMIP”) Crisis, we experience the negative vibrations of the original displacement, disempowerment, and disenfranchisement of the Lenape People. To combat this crisis, we will need to go beyond knowing how our laws, perceptions, and resources are used to perpetuate the MMIP epidemic today. We must acknowledge and reconcile the current harms of historical Indigenous trauma if we hope to end this crisis.
Congressional Hearings on MMIW
MURDERED/MISSING INDIGENOUS WOMEN Part 1 Hearing: Hearing Transcripts, Date: March 14, 2019, Source: Testimony, Permalink: Congressional Testimony
MURDERED/MISSING INDIGENOUS WOMEN Part 2, Hearing: Hearing Transcripts, Date: March 14, 2019, Source: Testimony, Permalink: Congressional Testimony
MURDERED/MISSING INDIGENOUS WOMEN Part 3, Hearing: Hearing Transcripts, Date: March 14, 2019, Source: Testimony, Permalink: Congressional Testimony
DOJ: Missing or Murdered Indigenous Persons
The Department of Justice is committed to addressing the persistent violence endured by Native American families and communities across the country, including by working with Tribal nations to address the important issues of missing or murdered indigenous persons. The Department views this work as a priority for its law enforcement components. It also recognizes the broader public safety and public health concerns that underlie many of these cases and require solutions from across the Department's components.
Missing and Murdered Indigenous Peoples (MMIP): Overview of Recent Research, Legislation, and Selected Issues for Congress
Across many countries and in the United States, Indigenous peoples-women and girls in particular-are disproportionately affected by violence. In the United States, for example, 84% of American Indian and Alaskan Native (AI/AN) women and 82% of AI/AN men reported experiencing violent victimizations in their lifetime.
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Studies have also shown that Native
American children are more likely to experience abuse and trauma than their non-Native peers. In November
2021, 3.6% of the missing persons included in the National Missing and Unidentified Person System (NamUs)
were identified as AI/AN, which was approximately four times their percentage in the U.S. population (0.9%). Advocacy by Native American and other Indigenous communities has brought increased attention to experiences
of violence in Indigenous communities using the terms Missing and Murdered Indigenous People (MMIP) and
Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG). This report provides an overview of recent
research and commonly cited barriers to addressing MMIP, background on legislation and programming to
improve data collection and criminal justice services for Native Americans, and selected policy issues Congress
may consider when conducting oversight or considering legislation related to MMIP.
MMIW USA
MMIW USA’s number one mission is to bring our missing home and help the families of the murdered cope and support them through the process of grief. We give them hands-on support and guidance and if we don’t have the answers, we get the answers so that these families do not feel abandoned and alone in this struggle like so many have before them. Our broader goal is to eradicate this problem so that the future generations thrive. We are doing that through education of the threats that they face and self-defense. We just started a monthly program to do just that. It is called Staying Sacred and we educate and have self-defense lessons at every meeting. Our strength lies in the fact that every single one of the staff and volunteers have been assaulted or trafficked and our passion is to be the kind of organization that we needed growing up and beyond.
National Indigenous Women's Resource Center
MMIW: Understanding the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Crisis Beyond Individual Acts of Violence
A Statement Prepared by NIWRC Policy Team Members Jacqueline Agtuca, Elizabeth Carr, Brenda Hill, Paula Julian, and Rose Quilt From the beginning of European contact, Indian nations as sovereigns, engaged with foreign countries as governments. As sovereigns, Indian nations held full authority over the lands and peoples within their respective territories. The diminishment of this authority to a position of dependent nations within the United States occurred as a result of U.S. colonization.
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A Statement Prepared by NIWRC Policy Team Members Jacqueline Agtuca, Elizabeth Carr, Brenda Hill, Paula Julian, and Rose Quilt

From the beginning of European contact, Indian nations as sovereigns, engaged with foreign countries as governments. As sovereigns, Indian nations held full authority over the lands and peoples within their respective territories. The diminishment of this authority to a position of dependent nations within the United States occurred as a result of U.S. colonization.

The quality of life of the citizens of any nation is bound to the authority and resources of their respective governments to create stable and safe communities.
Wikipedia: Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women
As a group that has been "socially, economically, and politically marginalized", Indigenous women have been frequent targets for hatred and violence. Underlying factors such as poverty and homelessness contribute to their victimization, as do historical factors such as racism, sexism, and the legacy of imperialism. The trauma caused by abuses under Canada's residential school system also plays a role. Indigenous women are between 3 and 31⁄2 times more likely to be victims of violent crime than other women, and the violence they face is often more severe.

Books at USD

Demanding Justice and Security by Rachel Sieder (Editor, Contribution by); Rosalva Aida Hernandez Castillo (Contribution by); Adriana Terven Salinas (Contribution by); Maria Teresa Sierra (Contribution by); Emma Cervone (Contribution by); Cristina Cucuri (Contribution by); Ana Cecilia Arteaga Bohrt (Contribution by); Leonor Lozano (Contribution by); Mariana Mora (Contribution by); Morna Macleod (Contribution by); Natalia De Marinis (Contribution by)
Call Number: KG483.W66 D46 2017eb
ISBN: 9780813587950
Publication Date: 2017
Across Latin America, indigenous women are organizing to challenge racial, gender, and class discrimination through the courts. Collectively, by engaging with various forms of law, they are forging new definitions of what justice and security mean within their own contexts and struggles. They have challenged racism and the exclusion of indigenous people in national reforms, but also have challenged 'bad customs' and gender ideologies that exclude women within their own communities. Featuring chapters on Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, and Mexico, the contributors to Demanding Justice and Security include both leading researchers and community activists. From Kichwa women in Ecuador lobbying for the inclusion of specific clauses in the national constitution that guarantee their rights to equality and protection within indigenous community law, to Me'phaa women from Guerrero, Mexico, battling to secure justice within the Inter-American Court of Human Rights for violations committed in the context of militarizing their home state, this book is a must-have for anyone who wants to understand the struggle of indigenous women in Latin America.
Forever loved : exposing the hidden crisis of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls in Canada by D. Memee Lavell-Harvard and Jennifer Brant
Call Number: Copley HV6250.4.W65 .F674 2016
ISBN: 9781772580679
Publication Date: 2016
To be born poor, an Indian, and a female is to be a member of the most disadvantaged minority in Canada today, a citizen minus. It is to be victimized and utterly powerless, and to be, by government decree, without legal recourse of any kind. —Kathleen Jamieson (92)
Incarcerated stories : Indigenous women migrants and violence in the settler-capitalist state by Shannon Speed
Call Number: HV8738 .S63 2019eb
ISBN: 9781469653143
Publication Date: 2019
Incarcerated stories uses ethnography and oral history to document and assess the plight of indigenous women migrants from Mexico and Central America to the United States. Their harrowing experiences of violence before, during, and after their migration parallel the worst stories we hear about immigrants' journeys; but as Speed argues, the circumstances for indigenous women are especially devastating against the backdrop of neoliberal economic and political reforms that have taken hold in Latin America as well as the U.S. First these women were promised greater autonomy and economic opportunity under reforms meant to promote indigenous rights at home, but the attention given to indigenous recognition veiled policies that furthered the economic disruption for women
Locally Led Peacebuilding by Stacey L. Connaughton (Editor); Jessica Berns (Editor)
Call Number: JZ5538 .L625 2020
ISBN: 9781538114094
Publication Date: 2019
The authors of this edited volume present a case for why locally led peacebuilding matters and how it can have measurable and meaningful impact, even beyond preventing political violence. This book contributes a set of local voices to a global problem - how to prevent armed conflict and lead to lasting peace. The authors argue that locally led peacebuilding by community based organizations (both formal and informal) plays a crucial role in preventing violence and cultivating peace, one that is complementary to peacebuilding work done by local, state, and national governments within countries and between nation-states. Through the case studies presented, Locally Led Peacebuilding presents evidence for how and why locally led peacebuilding can prevent violence, and invites practitioners and scholars to critically examine the implications of locally led initiatives. From these examples, we all have an opportunity to learn about creating, implementing, researching, and funding locally led peacebuilding.
Remembering Vancouver's Disappeared Women by Amber Dean
Call Number: Copley HV6250.4.W65
ISBN: 9781442660847
Publication Date: 2018
Between the late 1970s and the early 2000s, at least sixty-five women, many of them members of Indigenous communities, were found murdered or reported missing from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. In a work driven by the urgency of this ongoing crisis, which extends across the country, Amber Dean offers a timely, critical analysis of the public representations, memorials, and activist strategies that brought the story of Vancouver's disappeared women to the attention of a wider public. Remembering Vancouver's Disappeared Women traces "what lives on" from the violent loss of so many women from the same neighbourhood. Dean interrogates representations that aim to humanize the murdered or missing women, asking how these might inadvertently feed into the presumed dehumanization of sex work, Indigeneity, and living in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver. Taking inspiration from Indigenous women's research, activism, and art, she challenges readers to reckon with our collective implication in the ongoing violence of settler colonialism and to accept responsibility for addressing its countless injustices.
Vernacular Rights Cultures by Sumi Madhok
Call Number: JC571 .M3244 2021
ISBN: 9781108961844
Publication Date: 2021-07-31
Vernacular Rights Cultures offers a bold challenge to the dominant epistemologies and political practices of global human rights. It argues that decolonising global human rights calls for a serious epistemic accounting of the historically and politically specific encounters with human rights, and of the forms of world-making that underpin the stakes and struggles for rights and human rights around the globe. Through combining ethnographic investigations with political theory and philosophy, it goes beyond critiquing the Eurocentrism of global human rights, in order to document and examine the different political imaginaries, critical conceptual vocabularies, and gendered political struggles for rights and justice that animate subaltern mobilisations in 'most of the world'. Vernacular Rights Cultures demonstrates that these subaltern struggles call into being different and radical ideas of justice, politics and citizenship, and open up different possibilities and futures for human rights.
Vernacular Sovereignties by Manuela Lavinas Picq
Call Number: Copley GN380 .P537 2018
ISBN: 9780816538249
Publication Date: 2018
Indigenous women continue to be imagined as passive subjects at the margins of political decision-making, but they are in fact dynamic actors who shape state sovereignty and domestic and international politics. Manuela Lavinas Picq uses the case of Kichwa women successfully advocating for gender parity in the administration of Indigenous justice in Ecuador to show how Indigenous women can influence world politics.
Weaving the Past by Susan Kellogg
Call Number: E59.W8 K45 2005
ISBN: 0195123816
Publication Date: 2005
Weaving the Past offers a comprehensive and interdisciplinary history of Latin America's indigenous women. While the book concentrates on native women in Mesoamerica and the Andes, it covers indigenous people in other parts of South and Central America, including lowland peoples in and beyondBrazil, and Afro-indigenous peoples, such as the Garifuna, of Central America. Drawing on primary and secondary sources, it argues that change, not continuity, has been the norm for indigenous peoples whose resilience in the face of complex and long-term patterns of cultural change is due in nosmall part to the roles, actions, and agency of women. The book provides broad coverage of gender roles in native Latin America over many centuries, drawing upon a range of evidence from archaeology, anthropology, religion, and politics. Primary and secondary sources include chronicles, codices,newspaper articles, and monographic work on specific regions. Arguing that Latin America's indigenous women were the critical force behind the more important events and processes of Latin America's history, Kellogg interweaves the region's history of family, sexual, and labor history with theorigins of women's power in prehispanic, colonial, and modern South and Central America. Shying away from interpretations that treat women as house bound and passive, the book instead emphasizes women's long history of performing labor, being politically active, and contributing to, evensupporting, family and community well-being.

Videos: MMIW

How prejudice affects official search for missing Indigenous women, other women of color
While Gabby Petito's death has captured national attention, tens of thousands of people are reported missing or murdered every year in the U.S. Native women are murdered at rates 10 times the national average. In Wyoming alone, 710 indigenous people were reported missing from 2011 to 2020. Amna Nawaz discusses those statistics with Abigail Echo-Hawk, director of the Urban Indian Health Institute.
Indigenous Women Keep Going Missing in Montana
There’s an epidemic of missing and murdered indigenous women, and Native communities have had enough.
The Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women
Our prayers go out to the missing & murdered indigenous women. We love and miss you. This video features the West Shore Canoe Family. Song composed by Antone George. Video produced by Children of the Setting Sun. Music arranged and recorded by Mark Nichols.
Our Sisters In Spirit (MMIWG Documentary)
A short documentary that explores the question of calling a national public inquiry into the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women & girls in Canada or whether there may be a better approach.
PBS: Bring Her Home
Bring Her Home follows three Indigenous women – an artist, an activist, and a politician – as they fight to vindicate and honor their missing and murdered relatives who have fallen victims to a growing epidemic across Indian country. Despite the lasting effects from historical trauma, each woman must search for healing while navigating racist systems that brought about this very crisis.
Report: The root causes and first steps to helping the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women crisis
Not everyone knows their names: JoJo Boswell, Sheila St. Clair, Rose Downwind. They’re a few of the missing and murdered Native American women in Minnesota who represent what’s been a devastating trend reaching back hundreds of years and throughout the greater community. On Tuesday, the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW) task force released a report on the crisis – its root causes and possible solutions – after more than a year of research, meeting and sharing stories.
Understanding How the Laws Encourage Violence: History of MMIW
5500 Indigenous women and girls go missing or murdered every year. We need to change the laws that govern the Indigenous Tribes because they make it easier for people to attack indigenous people. Understanding the history of the creations of the laws and how they effect the people is important for productive and appropriate change.
Vanished: America's Missing Indigenous Women | Unreported World
Unreported World follows a private investigator trying to track down the indigenous women going missing without a trace in the wilderness of the United States. Thousands of indigenous women are believed to be missing or murdered, leaving families and loved ones desperately trying to find answers. But often confusion over jurisdictions between federal, state and tribal authorities can mean that many police investigations become cold cases that are never solved. Now indigenous women across the United States are stepping up to find their women.

MMIW: Data & The Void

DOJ: MMIP Data & Research
Reviewing, gathering and obtaining data is essential to determining the root causes of issues surrounding American Indians and Alaska Natives (AI/AN) who have gone missing, as well as those who have been murdered, so that issues can be understood and addressed. At the federal level, the U.S. government collects public safety and public health data across all populations, which includes data on AI/AN who have gone missing or have been murdered. States and Tribes also collect and analyze data, including state and Tribal task forces. While there are several challenges to collecting good data (including Tribal sovereignty, disparate data collection systems, and the fact that some adults may voluntarily become missing), pursuant to the Deputy Attorney General’s directive, the Department’s MMIP Steering Committee is working to improve data collection, data access and sharing, and education and outreach about federal databases, as well as develop a strategy for conducting ongoing data analysis.
Indigenous data, indigenous methodologies and indigenous data sovereignty
The field of Indigenous methodologies has grown strongly since Tuhiwai Smith’s 1999 groundbreaking book Decolonizing Indigenous Methodologies. For the most part however, there has been a marked absence of quantitative methodologies with the methods aligned with Indigenous methodologies predominantly qualitative. This article proposes that the absence of an Indigenous presence from Indigenous data production has resulted in an overwhelming statistical narrative of deficit for dispossessed Indigenous peoples around the globe. Using the theoretical concept of Indigenous Lifeworlds this article builds on the core premises of Walter and Andersen’s 2013 book Indigenous quantitative methodologies. Arguing for a fundamental disturbance of the Western logics of statistical data the article details recent developments in the field including the emergence of the Indigenous Data Sovereignty movement. The article also explores Indigenous quantitative methodologies in practice using the case study of a Tribal Epidemiology Centre in New Mexico.
MISSING & MURDERED INDIGENOUS WOMEN: A Digital Exhibition
Missing Data Obscures An Invisible Epidemic “Data,” in this context, refers to human lives. The lost data facilitated by jurisdictional conflicts and lack of resources for tribal and local law enforcement carries the weight of lost human beings.
MMNHWG REPORT 2022
This report is in solidarity with and recognition of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, and Two-Spirit (MMIWG2S) movement that originated in Canada and across Turtle Island.
Sovereign Bodies Institute: MMIP Database*
The MMIP Database logs cases of missing and murdered indigenous people of all genders and ages, from 1900 to the present. There are many lists and sources of information online, but no central database that is routinely updated, spans beyond colonial borders, and thoroughly logs important aspects of the data, and overall, there is a chronic lack of data on this violence. The Database works to address that need, by maintaining a comprehensive resource to support community members, advocates, activists, and researchers in their work towards justice for our stolen relatives. *Available by request only mmiwdatabase@sovereign-bodies.org

MMIW: Artistic Expression

Jaime Black: The REDress Project
The REDress Project: AN AESTHETIC RESPONSE TO THE MORE THAN 1000 MISSING AND MURDERED ABORIGINAL WOMEN IN CANADA. The REDress Project focuses around the issue of missing or murdered Aboriginal women across Canada. It is an installation art project based on an aesthetic response to this critical national issue. The project has been installed in public spaces throughout Canada and the United States as a visual reminder of the staggering number of women who are no longer with us. Through the installation I hope to draw attention to the gendered and racialized nature of violent crimes against Aboriginal women and to evoke a presence through the marking of absence.
Murdered And Missing In Montana
Murdered And Missing In Montana is a 90-minute documentary that focuses on the disappearance and mysterious deaths of three Indigenous girls.
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Oxygen: True Crime Series
National Inquiry into MMIWG
Our Vision Indigenous women and Two-Spirit people have traditionally been revered as life-givers and caregivers. This is why we say, “our women and girls are sacred.” But Indigenous women and girls, including those who are 2SLGBTQQIA, continue to be devalued. All too many become the victims of violence. Our vision for the National Inquiry is to build a foundation that allows Indigenous women and girls to reclaim their power and place.
Native Women's Association of Canada: Art Gallery
The Native Women’s Association of Canada (NWAC) has compiled and curated one of the world’s finest collections of Indigenous art from across the Americas. It is on display at NWAC’s new Social, Economic, and Cultural Innovation Centre in downtown Gatineau, Que. Each piece is for sale, with money from the sales supporting artists. Many of the pieces can be seen on this page. Take some time to scroll through the gallery for your enjoyment, or with intention for purchasing a truly beautiful and authentic example of Indigenous artistry.
SHEDDING A LIGHT ON MMIW THROUGH ART
[These} are key artists in the MMIW Movement who are both portraying the pain the indigenous community is going through and bringing attention to this movement through their artwork. Nani Chacon, Karen Savage-Blue, Maxine Noel, Jackie Fawn
Sing Our Rivers Red
Sing Our Rivers Red (SORR) events aim to bring awareness to the epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women and colonial gender based violence in the United States and Canada. The events strive to raise consciousness, unite ideas and demand action for Indigenous women, girls, Two Spirit and LGBTQQIA people who have been murdered or gone missing, tortured, raped, trafficked, and assaulted, who have not had the proper attention or justice. SORR also is being planned in solidarity and with collaborative spirit, meant to support the efforts built in Canada, as well as highlight the need for awareness and action to address colonial gender violence in the United States.
Walking With Our Sisters
A Commemorative Art Installation for the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women of Canada and the United States Over 1,181+ native women and girls in Canada have been reported missing or have been murdered in the last 30 years. Many vanished without a trace with inadequate inquiry into their disappearance or murders paid by the media, the general public, politicians and even law enforcement. This is a travesty of justice.
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Walking With Our Sisters is by all accounts a massive commemorative art installation comprised of 1,763+ pairs of moccasin vamps (tops) plus 108 pairs of children’s vamps created and donated by hundreds of caring and concerned individuals to draw attention to this injustice. The large collaborative art piece will be made available to the public through selected galleries and locations. The work exists as a floor installation made up of beaded vamps arranged in a winding path formation on fabric and includes cedar boughs. Viewers remove their shoes to walk on a path of cloth alongside the vamps.