In support of the land acknowledgment, this website documents and facilitates Vassar’s efforts to build and sustain relationships with Native communities; expand opportunities for Native students, Native faculty and other employees; and collaborate with Native nations to know better the Indigenous peoples, past and present, who care for this land.
Native American Studies at Vassar College
The American Studies Program offers a correlate sequence in Native American Studies, a multi- and interdisciplinary field, in which students examine Indigenous cultures, politics, histories, and literatures, in a primarily North American context.
Student Projects
- Indigenous Environmental Activism
A Blog and Podcast Series - Indigenous Vassar: Acknowledging the Land and its Peoples
A Story Map
- AMST 282: Decolonizing the Exhibition: Critical Approaches to Contemporary Indigenous Art
A Curated Virtual Exhibition - AMST 282: Decolonizing the Exhibition: Imagining Indigenous Futures
A Curated Virtual Exhibition
Inclusive History
The Vassar Inclusive History initiative, launched in February of 2023, is dedicated to evaluating, reflecting on, and unearthing the College’s history with respect to justice, equity, and fairness. Focused on stories, lives, and questions that have been neglected in the telling of the history of Vassar College, the Inclusive History initiative represents a promise and an invitation to the entire Vassar community. Learn more
Past Events
A keynote lecture with 2025–2026 Tatlock Fellow Dr. Kyle Whyte (enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation).
The “Sky Woman Women” project holds space for eighteen women storytellers from Mohawk, Seneca and Tuscarora tribal affiliations (enrolled, unenrolled, and not enrolled), telling and retelling a Haudenosaunee creation story to each other. A Q&A with the artist and featured storytellers follows the screening.
Free and open to the public
Featuring over sixty works added to the Loeb Art Center’s collection between 2020–2025, Chronostasia explores various ways artworks can alter our perception of time. Free and open to the public
MODfest 2026
A book talk by Andrew Lipman ’01 in conversation with James H. Merrell, Professor Emeritus of History. This event is open to the public.
Hock E Aye Vi Edgar Heap of Birds (Cheyenne and Arapaho Nation) is an acclaimed multidisciplinary artist whose work has long advocated for recognition of historic and ongoing forms of oppression of Indigenous peoples in the US and globally.
Stories
Land Acknowledgment
We acknowledge that Vassar stands upon the homelands of the Munsee Lenape, Indigenous peoples who have an enduring connection to this place despite being forcibly displaced by European colonization. Munsee Lenape peoples continue today as the Stockbridge-Munsee Community in Wisconsin, the Delaware Tribe and the Delaware Nation in Oklahoma, and the Munsee Delaware Nation in Ontario. Read the full statement.