Date entered into PhD program: Fall 2013
My name is Yvette J. Collin and I am of Cheyenne, Arapaho, Comanche, and Mayan descent on my mother's side, and Nakota, Choctaw, and European descent on my father's side. My Indian name, as it is translated into English, is “Medicine Road.” As I consider it my “real name,” I often publish my work using this name.
My research is focused on the relationship between the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas and their horse. My family has spent the past four or five years gathering what is left of our People's traditional horses, as my People's oral history teaches that "we always had the horse," that the indigenous horse of the Americas did not “die out” during the Ice Age, and that "our horses" were here before the explorers came to the Americas from Europe. We currently have roughly 80 of these sacred animals at our home in Northern Alabama, and visitors come from all over the world to see them, pray with them, and walk amongst them.
I have my B.A. from The Johns Hopkins University (Writing Seminars), and a Joint M.A. from New York University (Journalism and Latin American Caribbean Studies.) I am pursuing my PhD in Indigenous Studies here at UAF, and I am honored to be a part of a program that cares so much about addressing the issues that are affecting our world.
