November 2022 – Graduate

Navajo Nation
Pinon, AZ

Scholarship: Special Higher Education Program
School: University of California Davis 
Degree: Native American Studies
GPA: 3.9

Yazzie is a current Ph.D. candidate at the University of California Davis in the Native American Studies Department and earning a Designated Emphasis in Feminist Theory and Research. She first attended the tribal community college located in Tsaile, Arizona known as Diné College. After earning an AA degree in Diné Studies, she then enrolled at Fort Lewis College located in Durango, Colorado where she graduated with a BA in Native American and Indigenous Studies with honors. She then applied to the graduate program in Native American Studies at the University of California Davis where she earned her MA degree in 2021. 

Her in-progress dissertation research uplifts the significance of Diné creative arts with, by, and for her community. My research amplifies Diné ways of doing history – privileging Diné knowledge and practices – as a means to Indigenize academic theories, methods, and practices. Her larger project will share the significance of how Diné women in Pinon, Arizona build long-lasting connections to one another (Peoples), the lands/waters (places), and rug weaving itself (projects). Through community-based and Native feminism-centered research, her work uplifts Diné women’s ways of reclaiming and healing their identities through rug weaving.