Dovie Thomason
Dovie Thomason imagines herself as a river, fed by many streams: Lakota, Apache, and Scot Traveller ancestry, urban Chicago, rural Texas and international travels, the Internet and Indigenous elders, family teachings, kitchen table wisdom, and university classrooms — and draws on those contrasts and cultures in her work. Conveying these stories respectfully and responsibly is Thomason’s calling and has made her one of the most respected and admired storytellers of her generation. When she adds personal stories and untold histories, the result is a contemporary narrative of Indigenous history and identity in North America told provocatively with elegance, wit, and passion.
She has been featured at countless prominent global events, including the Kennedy Center, National Museum of the American Indian, the Smithsonian, Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre, and festivals from Tennessee to Estonia, New Zealand to New Mexico. She has shared storytelling as an Artist-in-Education on many state rosters for over thirty years. She is a recipient of the National Storytelling Network’s Circle of Excellence award and the Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers’ Traditional Storyteller Award.