National Native American Heritage Month 2020

Native American Heritage Month celebrates the rich and diverse cultures, traditions, and history and acknowledges the important contributions of American Indians and Alaska Natives in the United States. We encourage you to show your UCSF PRIDE by sharing your Indigenous/Native American heritage with your colleagues and friends. Here are a few ways you can share.

Change your social media and Zoom profile picture to reflect your Native American/ Indigenous Heritage
On Zoom use a virtual background showing your Indigenous/Native American Heritage (Bonus if the photo is one your took yourself)
Share your pictures and/or short videos of yourself in cultural attire or engaging in a cultural activity. Send to [email protected].
Add "Native American Heritage Month" and/or an image showing your Indigenous/Native American Heritage to your Email Signature

Fact Sheets and Infographics

Native American Factsheet

Legal Basics - Native American Law

Native Youth at Risk for Sex Trafficking

Historical Events Timeline

Highlight: Francesca Vega, UCSF Vice Chancellor, Community and Government Relations

What is your role at UCSF?

I am the Vice Chancellor of Community & Government Relations, which is a new role for UCSF. In this capacity, I lead a team that generates support and facilitates dialogue between UCSF and local, state and federal entities. We also build and strengthen key relationships with the communities that UCSF serves and are often at the frontline of UCSF’s response to a wide range of political and policy issues.

What is your personal story? How did you get here?

How much time do we have?! Career-wise, I always saw a future in public policy or public-service but it wasn’t until I was in college that my passion for access to quality education started to define the path I would go on to pursue. I then had the opportunity to work for the late Assemblymember Marco Antonio Firebaugh who authored legislation, AB 540, that laid the foundation for our Dreamers and DACA students. Access to quality public education is a game changer and transformative, how it impacts people’s lives will always be incredibly inspiring to me. Working for the University of California and the California State University, has been a very natural fit for me—challenging at times but I have greatly appreciated being in environments where I’m surrounded by many equally passionate, value-driven individuals.

As someone who comes from indigenous – Choctaw Native American and French Creole mother and a Mexican-American father, what does Native American Heritage Month mean to you?

It means that I’m especially intentional when taking time to reflect on where I came from, what my family’s story and history contributed to the woman I am today and why it is more critical than ever to give back and support our most vulnerable communities. This is a month that I feel it is especially important to focus on gratitude.

What advice or life lessons can you impart to our BCH patients, especially those who are of Native American or Latinx heritage?

Be authentic and true to yourself, even when it is difficult or lonely. Confidence in who you are and the unique perspective you “bring to the table” are invaluable. Your spirit, values, personality, these are also critical components to how one leads and embraces leadership. I would also add, perhaps now more than ever, to patient with yourself. This is something I always need to remind myself but, with so many challenges and uncertainty, we must be patient with ourselves and try to take on one challenge at a time.

Fun Facts

Native Lands

This map shows you what Indigenous lands you're living on. The crowd-sourced, interactive website mapping traditional territories of Indigenous people, treaties and language has grown to become so much more. The map was created by Victor G. Temprano, a Canadian who was "born in traditional Katzie territory and raised in the Okanagan" and who began work on the project in 2015. It currently covers the USA, Canada, much of Mexico, Australia, South Africa, and expanding amounts of territory in South America.

History of the Emeryville Shellmound

The Emeryville Shellmound was a highly remarkable historic, cultural, and sacred site established by Ohlone Indians over centuries of use from 500 B.C. to approximately 1700 A.D. These people were among the earliest inhabitants of the region now known as the San Francisco Bay Area. They built their villages on the mound and buried their dead, creating, over the centuries, a sixty foot high mound with a diameter of about 350 feet. This significant site functioned holistically in both the secular and sacred realms, and as such, should not have been disturbed, but honored as a place set apart from the mundane world.

Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area

The present-day Muwekma Ohlone Tribe is comprised of all of the known surviving American Indian lineages aboriginal to the San Francisco Bay region who trace their ancestry through the Missions Dolores, Santa Clara, and San Jose; and who were also members of the historic Federally Recognized Verona Band of Alameda County. The aboriginal homeland of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe includes the following counties: San Francisco, San Mateo, most of Santa Clara, Alameda, Contra Costa, and portions of Napa, Santa Cruz, Solano and San Joaquin. This large contiguous geographical area, which historically crosscuts aboriginal linguistic and tribal boundaries, fell under the sphere of influence of the aforementioned three missions between 1776 and 1836. The missionization policies deployed by the Catholic Church and militarily supported by the Hispanic Empire, brought many distantly related, and in some cases, already inter-married tribal groups together at the missions.

Project 562

Created by Matika Wilbur, Project 562 is a multi-year national photography project dedicated to photographing over 562 federally recognized tribes in The United States resulting in an unprecedented repository of imagery and oral histories that accurately portrays contemporary Native Americans. This creative, consciousness-shifting work will be widely distributed through national curricula, artistic publications, exhibitions, and online portals.

Matika has visited members of over 300 sovereign nations throughout 40 states, from Tlingits in Alaska to the Pimas in Arizona, Pomos in California to Wampanoags on Cape Cod. Through her lens, we are able to see the diversity, vibrancy, and realness of Indian Country, and in seeing, challenge and surpass stereotypical representations and refresh the national conversation about contemporary Native America.