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We are overjoyed to show you a glimpse into the first premiere of Sacred Wisdom, Sacred Earth—a living, collaborative documentary project that began as a shared dream shaped through deep dialogue with Native elders, knowledge holders, and artists across the Great Lakes. The documentary has grown through years of deep listening, heartfelt dialogue, and community care. From the forming of our Indigenous Advisory Council in 2021, to the creative partnership with Bravebird Film Productions in 2022, and the path we have forged together with Wisconsin’s Tribal leaders and Indigenous culture keepers since 2019 when Loka was launched, this documentary showcases what is possible when community, collaboration, and Indigenous wisdom lead the way.
We are deeply grateful to our friends from the Menominee Nation for hosting and organizing an amazing premiere of the documentary at the Menominee Reservation on July 16th, 2025. It was a wonderful celebration where culture keepers featured in the film, Loka’s Indigenous advisory council members, project partners, and Native community members came together to witness and hold this offering in the spirit of kinship, reverence, and collective remembering in which it was created.
More premiere screenings will take place with our Native partners throughout this fall and winter (find more information here!). For those of you who are wondering, the documentary will be released outside of Wisconsin in 2026!
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Dekila Chungyalpa
Director, the Loka Initiative at the Center for Healthy Minds
University of Wisconsin–Madison
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Wisdom From Our Culture Keepers
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The documentary is organized in four acts—Connection to Land, Colonization, Identity Reclamation & Language Revitalization, All Our Relations, and Vision for the Future and Call to Reconnect. The stories in the documentary are told by Native elders, culture keepers and knowledge holders, and leaders who speak to what must be learned, remembered and passed on in these times of climate and ecological crises and spiritual disconnection.
When talking about the significance of the documentary, one of the featured culture keepers, Mark Denning (Menominee and Oneida), remarked:
“There is a movie called Superman out there right now and it's getting a lot of digs with people saying that it’s about kindness. This documentary is Our Superman. Out there in the non-Native world, the superhero story is about one individual who shows kindness. For us and our culture, we have so many figures that are kind, that help us understand who we are and how we are. It’s not just one person. This movie stands apart from others that exist now and the ones that are coming because it is about the collective We.”
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“This documentary has been years in the making. It is a very joyous occasion and we have come here to celebrate this day and honor the stories and sacred knowledge that are carried by our people. We always remember our ancestors and the original teachings of who we are and you can hear this in the invocation and see this in the meal you will have and the drumming and the dancing you will see - the generations of tradition and knowledge is embedded in all of these pieces that we still carry today.”
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The welcome was followed by the Veterans of the Menominee Nation presenting the Eagle staff, the Menominee Nation flag, the US flag, the Veterans of the Menominee Nation Flag, and the POW/MIA flag, and an invocation given by Elder Dennis Kenote. Luke Besaw offered a prayer and blessing for the meal to start off the event in a good way.
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A future culture keeper beholds the dancers.
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The dancers were led by Dana Warrington, one of the best known dancers in the Northern Traditional and Woodland style. A special dance was performed, the Green Corn dance, which was described by Chairman Awanohopay as
“a dance that honors our connection to Mother Earth, which has so much meaning and spiritual and cultural and traditional significance for our community. The specific movements we see in our dancers follow the movements that the spirits make on the land.”
After some introductory remarks from Dekila Chungyalpa, our director who served as the Executive Producer for the documentary, and Brian McInnes, the producer of the film, we moved to the cafeteria to experience a diverse buffet of food that was prepared by Indigenous chefs, Francisco Alegria and Mikiya Alloway, who both belong to the Menominee Tribe. Guests enjoyed a taste of the Great Lakes with pan-seared whitefish, complemented by a vibrant summer vegetable medley, wild rice pilaf, poblano and blue corn bread, plus refreshing bergamot, raspberry, and strawberry cedar-infused waters by Bonnie McKiernan, educator and Menominee elder.
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Guests enjoying dinner in the beautiful new Menominee Indian High School’s cafeteria!
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Following the screening of the film, we had a panel of attending culture keepers who were involved in the documentary, who reflected on their reasons for being part of the project and their hopes for its impact.
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(L-R: Brian McInnes, Donavan Waupoose, Mildred “Tinker” Schuman, Tina Kuckkahn,
Wade Fernandez, Mark Denning, Guy Reiter, Joey Awonohopay, and Gary Besaw)
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One of the Menominee culture keepers featured in the documentary, Guy Reiter (Menominee), said:
“I think about who is sitting with me in these seats right now and others in the audience who could be up here with us, and I realize that nobody gets here alone. There are a lot of people you don’t see who are standing behind us and around us. All of those ones that support us and give us love and strength, some of whom have passed on to the beautiful world. One of the things I love about this project is the quality of the wisdom that everyone here and not here bring and it is an honor to be a part of that.”
The Director of the Menominee Tribal Dept. of Agriculture and Food Systems, Gary Besaw, one of Loka’s esteemed advisors since 2019, who emceed the entire event, closed the evening by speaking on the importance of tribal initiatives and inter-tribal projects that build community resilience in the current times. He made special mention of the Tribal Elder Food Box Project, which is led by Dan Cornelius, Deputy Director of the Great Lakes Indigenous Law Center in the UW Law School, and a member of the SWSE Creative Committee.
Several people commented on how much joy and spiritual resilience they experienced while watching the documentary and throughout the evening. Tina Kuckkhan (Lac du Flambeau Tribe of Lake Superior Chippewa), one of the culture keepers featured in the film, spoke on why Indigenous knowledge and wisdom matters now more than ever, when she observed:
“Our sovereignty is inherent; no one gives it to us or can take it away. For me, I got involved with this film because it is important to recognize that we are in prophetic times right now and our teachings are powerful and they need to be shared with the world. We need to inspire the change that must happen now and make the decisions that protect us all in the future.”
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Reflecting on the entire event, Brian McInnes spoke for the entire SWSE production team when he stated:
“It is an incredible thing to see how all of this so seamlessly came together in such a beautiful braided narrative. This is quite simply the most beautiful community welcoming I think I've ever attended.”
He went on to emphasize why this documentary matters to him:
“Seeing the strength of our nations come together in the way that it did with the dancers, music, singers, the elders, the children, the community members - it was reminiscent of everything that we heard in the stories featured in the documentary. It is a reminder about the significance of this incredible pivotal moment of revitalization and change that our elders have talked about in all of our different nations' prophecies. We hope the documentary lets our people know where they can come to hear their own stories and find the truth they're needing in their own respective lives. That it helps our non-Indigenous allies know what we are about and to better understand the truth of Indigenous history, sovereignty and stewardship. Perhaps most importantly, it lets our people know that they are home wherever they are and to feel good about being Indigenous, whatever nation they may come from.”
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(L-R: Gary Besaw, Brian McInnes, Alejandro Miranda, Carla Vigue, Joey Awonohopay, Dekila Chungyalpa, Mirtha Sosa Pacheco, and Gerald Kaquatosh)
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The Loka Initiative is so thankful to our Film Partners: Bravebird, Center for Healthy Minds (CHM), and the Great Lakes Inter-Tribal Council (GLITC) for believing in our vision and walking this path with us. We would like to extend our deepest gratitude to our featured Culture Keepers who so generously offered their knowledge and their wisdom: Joey Awonohopay, Gary Besaw, Roxanne DeLille, Marin “Mark” Denning, Zoe Fess, Tina Kuckkahn, Edith Leoso, Guy Reiter, Kathleen Smith, Elena Terry, Robert VanZile, Donavan Waupoose, and Dan Wiggins Jr. We would not have made it to the goalpost without the diligent guidance of our Indigenous Advisory Council: Aaron Bird Bear, Gary Besaw, Dan Cornelius, Brian McInnes, Janice Rice, Elena Terry, Carla Vigue and Mike Wiggins Jr. We are so proud to have worked with our Director, Alejandro Miranda, who brought all of his profound film making skills, and with his team, provided visual richness and stunning imagery to match the wisdom of the culture keepers, and our Producer, Brian McInnes, who interviewed the culture keepers with immense depth and gentle care, and took on the additional responsibility of safeguarding traditional knowledge that was shared with full integrity. We received so much care and generosity from community members who unstintingly fed us, consulted with us, watched various drafts of the documentary and gave us feedback – thank you to everyone who participated in the creation of this documentary. Lastly, we offer our heartfelt thanks to our Donors, without whom this visionary project would not be possible: Bess Family Foundation, Agnes Bourne, Caritas Foundation, The Fetzer Institute, Peggy Hedberg, Kalliopeia Foundation, and the Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation.
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Loka is an interdisciplinary collaboration among different programs at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. It is housed in the Center for Healthy Minds in collaboration with:
The opinions expressed here are solely the author’s and don’t reflect the opinions or beliefs of
UW-Madison, the Center for Healthy Minds or their affiliates.
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