{"id":40032,"date":"2026-04-16T13:58:33","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T18:58:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/unitedresourceconnection.org\/cannon-ball-nd-58528\/indigenous-matriarchs-rising-in-leadership-and-community-care\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T13:58:40","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T18:58:40","slug":"indigenous-matriarchs-rising-in-leadership-and-community-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitedresourceconnection.org\/cannon-ball-nd-58528\/indigenous-matriarchs-rising-in-leadership-and-community-care\/","title":{"rendered":"Indigenous matriarchs rising in leadership and community care"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Lily<\/a><\/p>\n

Lily Mendoza at the Matriarchs Rising presentation. (Photo by Marnie Cook)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

RAPID CITY \u2013 Matriarchal societies have always had to adapt to survive, and for the Lakota that adaptation has meant continually redefining strength, leadership, and kinship in the face of ongoing change. At a recent weekly session at the Oyate Health Center, held in the Oglala Room and attended by thirty people in person and online, Lily Mendoza spoke powerfully about Indigenous matriarchs and their enduring role in shaping communities. The event, sponsored by the Great Plains Tribal Leaders Health Board\u2019s Tribal Opioid Response Program, offered an inspiring look at how women\u2019s leadership has sustained families and nations through crisis after crisis.<\/p>\n

Mendoza is a leader in the restoration of Indigenous women\u2019s roles in wellness, leadership, and land stewardship and is the founder of the Red Ribbon Skirt Society, a grassroots organization based in Rapid City that supports families of missing and murdered Indigenous women.<\/p>\n

In her Power Point \u201cFrom Evolution to Revolution: Indigenous Matriarchs Rising,\u201d Mendoza traced the evolution of matriarchs from the early twentieth century to the present day, following their impact across Turtle Island. She explored how Indigenous women have moved from traditional roles in warfare and protection to today\u2019s \u201cmodern warrior\u201d existence\u2014fighting for education, political voice, community health, and especially the survival of the tiospaye.<\/p>\n

Mendoza is a citizen of the Cheynne River Sioux Tribe. Her father is Mexican and mother is Lakota. She didn\u2019t have a lot of matriarchal influence in her life, which is a shared experience for many tribal members as a result of the Christian patriarchy which enforced Western gender norms in their effort to limit women\u2019s roles. She spoke fondly of the stories her mother would tell her of her grandmother baking bread. Mendoza later drew on those stories during a difficult time in her life, turning a simple idea\u2014baking organic bread\u2014into a home-based business.<\/p>\n

Mendoza shared her own family story, tracing a line of matriarchs from her great-grandmother Julie through her grandmother, mother, and sister. In her telling, a matriarch is not simply the oldest woman in a family, but the one who holds the household together when resources are scarce, keeps track of relationships, history, and obligations, carries stories, language, and ceremony, and becomes the person everyone turns to in times of crisis. \u201cThese are the individuals that we go to and ask questions, we listen to their stories, and most importantly, if we can, we should record those stories so that we have them.\u201d In Lily\u2019s family, her sister has taken on the role of historian, writing down names and stories so they are not lost. \u201cShe knows everything about our history, when we grew up in El Paso, our aunts taking care of us, and then coming back to South Dakota.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said it is also an act of resistance to erasure\u2014documenting a lineage that colonial systems were never meant to preserve.<\/p>\n

Mendoza widened the lens to talk about matriarchs of the community, women whose impact extends far beyond their own bloodlines, and who made an impact on her. She named figures such as Elle Deloria, Elizabeth Cook-Lynn, and Ada Deer. She said that matriarchs are often the ones who found and sustain programs, mentor young people and emerging leaders, stand at the forefront of cultural and educational work, and provide stability where institutions have failed.<\/p>\n

One very influential matriarch was Harriet Skye, a Hunkpapa Lakota from Standing Rock. Skye was a pioneering Native American journalist, TV host, and advocate for Native American education, and served on the North Dakota Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. \u201cShe was one of the first commissioners in 1971 and I remember her because my parents, my mother, my aunties, really talked about her because they were so proud of the work that she was doing. I remember her and the work that she did across the United states. She was pretty amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mendoza spoke plainly about the burdens many women are carrying today. Colonization disrupted traditional family structures and cultural teaching, contributing to poverty, addiction, and violence. Today, many matriarchs are raising children and grandchildren, working, supporting relatives in crisis, and carrying cultural and community responsibilities at the same time. As a single parent, Lily\u2019s story of doing this largely on her own reflected a broader reality in which women are expected to be endlessly strong in the absence of men\u2014yet at conferences, the question she most often hears from men is, \u201cWhat are you doing for the men?\u201d Her answer is, \u201cThat\u2019s you\u2019re responsibility to figure that out, because we\u2019re going to still going to move on and do what we need to do. I understand the struggle. I\u2019ve been here in Rapid for forty years. I know that with that role that was taken away from the men as warriors, I understand that whole historical part of it. But at some point, you have to get it together. I don\u2019t know how that\u2019s going to happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matriarchs should lead also as environmental stewards and have a responsibility to protect water quality, challenge pollution, and support the work of tribal nations and water protectors. Mendoza lives off the grid. \u201cI chose to do that because it\u2019s a simple life. I can say simple, but it involves things like hauling water, so it takes some planning. But I don\u2019t need a lot. I\u2019ve also started to grow my own food.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said she likes making daily choices that reflect cultural teachings about care for the land. For her, this is not a separate environmental cause; it is an extension of matriarchal care. Protecting land and water is part of ensuring that future generations inherit clean water, living land, and a relationship to place rooted in respect rather than extraction.<\/p>\n

Looking ahead, Mendoza urged women to form circles and groups where they can study women\u2019s teachings and ceremonies, share stories, grief, and practical knowledge, and build networks of mutual aid for single mothers, grandmothers, and caregivers. \u201cParenting and caregiving,\u201d she emphasized, \u201c must be shared responsibilities, and healing and cultural teachings must be available to men as well as women.\u201d The goal is not to demand that matriarchs be even stronger, but to restore balance so that women are no longer carrying everything alone<\/p>\n

Mendoza said matriarchs are not only figures from the past; they are here, right now, shaping the future. \u201cWhen you see an elderly woman, just shake her hand because she\u2019s had a long, hard life, and she\u2019s still there, helping community.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Contact Marnie Cook at cookm8715@gmail.com)<\/span><\/p>\n

The post Indigenous matriarchs rising in leadership and community care<\/a> first appeared on Native Sun News Today<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Lily Mendoza at the Matriarchs Rising presentation. (Photo by Marnie Cook) RAPID CITY \u2013 Matriarchal societies have always had to adapt to survive, and for the Lakota that adaptation has meant continually redefining strength, leadership, and kinship in the face of ongoing change. At a recent weekly session at the <\/p>\n

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