Indigenous Health

Gather (2020, 74 min.)

GATHER follows the stories of natives on the frontlines of a growing movement to reconnect with spiritual and cultural identities that were devastated by genocide. An indigenous chef embarks on a ambitious project to reclaim ancient food ways on the Apache reservation; in South Dakota a gifted Lakota high school student, raised on a buffalo ranch, is proving her tribes native wisdom through her passion for science; and a group of young men of the Yurok tribe in Northern California are struggling to keep their culture alive and rehabilitate the habitat of their sacred salmon. All these stories combine to show how the reclaiming and recovery of ancient food ways is a way forward for native Americans to bring back health and vitality to their people.

Mama Irene: Healer of the Andes (2022, 71 min.)

The documentary follows 86 year-old healer, Mama Irene in her everyday life, highlighting her healing methods and passion to serve each patient who knocks on her door: from local women who travel hours or days by foot through the Andes, to a medical doctor from India seeking a cure for illness that Western medicine had failed to help.

Warrior Up! Episode 3, Tréchelle Bunn: Movement is Medicine (2024, 20 min.)

Warrior Up! is a documentary series that follows Indigenous youth across Turtle Island who are standing up and making change, transforming their communities, their lands and their lives for the better. Episode 3 follows Tréchelle Bunn, a twenty-two-year-old University of Manitoba hockey player whose life motto is “movement is medicine.” Normally that medicine takes the form of hockey practices and games, but the 200 unmarked graves found at Kamloops Residential School in 2021 pushed Trechelle, who is Dakota, to think of other ways that movement could help heal her home community through Canada's first-ever Reconciliation Run. 

The Hawaiian Art of Healing (2011, 69 min.)

From the age of five, Henry Auwae learned the art of lā‘au lapaʻau (herbal medicine) from his grandmother, a woman whose knowledge extended back to nineteenth century Hawai‘i. In this documentary series, "Papa" Auwae shares this traditional knowledge.

Essence of Healing: Journey of American Indian Nurses (2016, 59 min.)

This film showcases the lives of 14 nurses who live and work in the Upper Great Plains. While their lives and stories are different, they all share a common theme -- their life experiences and American Indian heritage have made them extraordinary healers.

The Healing Road (2009, 61 min.)
Discusses Native American mental health issues and the combined use of traditional Native American healing techniques and western professional healing approaches. The video contains two sections, one dealing with the historical and cultural forces affecting Native Americans and a panel discussion in the second half. The panel includes four multicultural specialists, representing different racial/ethnic groups, discussing cultural differences between western professional helping approaches and the healing techniques used by other people and cultures. A discussion guide accompanies the film.