Unbroken: Indigenous Peoples Today

Akalei Brown, Taos Pueblo and Native Hawaiian Nations - History Consultant, Business Owner, and Fashion Designer

Akalei Brown is a Native history consultant, business owner, and fashion designer from the Taos Pueblo and Native Hawaiian nations. As an avid multitasker, she spends most of her time advocating for Native American studies to be included in public school curriculum and fighting for change in the Native American foster care program. She also manages her business, Corn Maiden Designs, and helps her husband Nick Ohitika Najin and daughter Haleakalā manage their soap business Lakota Body Care.

"My name is Akalei Brown, and I'm Taos Pueblo and 'Kānaka Maoli' (Native Hawaiian for 'native/indigenous/true people'). I'm actually an entrepreneur, not an activist, but I got thrown into activism because of my degrees in Native American history, and any time you bring up Native American history, it's automatically some form of activism.

"My overall goal in life is to have Native American history implemented nationwide all the way from elementary through high school and to make it mandatory in college as well, but I would also like to help change the foster care system because of how it incarcerates children. The reason for this is that Native American children are put in foster care more per capita than any other race yet we're only 2% of the population.

"There's some states where 40% of the kids in foster care are Native but again they're only 2% of the population. So, there's a lot of work to be done. It shouldn't be an incarceral system, it should be a system of raising kids to be good citizens - Good human beings with integrity. But instead they lock them up and that causes people to become institutionalized.

"As far as activism goes that's my fight because I really care about kids. Especially when they're in those systems and they don't have any voice. It's very similar to my ancestors when they were trapped on the reservations and they couldn't leave and they didn't have a voice. No one would listen."

nativeAmericanHistoryAdvisorandfashionDesignerAkaleiBrownJason SinnJason Sinn PhotographyNative dressactivismactivism photographeractivism photographyactivism portraitactivistactivist photographeractivist photographyamerican indianamerican indian photographyamerican indian portraitartart photographyartistartworkcreativecreative photographycreative portraitcreative portrait photographycreative portraitureculturalcultural photographercultural photographycultural portraitcultural portrait photographycultureculture photographerculture photographyculture portraitdresseducationhuman rightsindigenousindigenous cultureindigenous peopleindigenous people todayindigenous peoples todayindigenous personindigenous photographyindigenous portrait photographyjournalismlovenative americannative american fashionnative american journalismnative american photographynative american portraitnative american portrait photographynative culturenative lives matternative pridenative rightsoutdoorspeacephotographerphotographyphotography artphotoshootportraitportrait photographerportrait photographyportraitsportraitureprofessional activismprofessional photographerprofessional photographyprotest photographerprotest photographyprotest portraitreflectionresistresistanceunbroken indigenous peoples todaywaterwisdom