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Eberly College of Arts and Sciences Program for Native American Studies
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Native American Residency Program

Bringing distinguished Native American leaders to campus

An important part of WVU’s Native American Studies Program is the tradition of bringing distinguished Native American leaders, writers, artists, and activists to campus to lecture and interact with our students and fellow community members (see below, “Legacy of Distinction”). 

Note: Above photo used with permission, Jeff Schultz Photography.

Mike Williams, Sr. (Yup’ik)
Elder-in-Residence March 22-28, 2026

Man with gray-white hair wearing glasses and a jacket with a tribal print edge.
WVU’s Native American Studies Program welcomes Alaska Native Rights Leader Mike Williams, Sr. (Yup’ik) March 22-28 as the 2026 Elder-in-Residence. 

Welcome Reception & Free Public Lecture:

Mr. Williams has given more than 50 years of unparalleled service to his home Village of Akiak, the State of Alaska, and a wide range of regional and national organizations. His many accomplishments have been recognized with an honorary doctorate from the University of Alaska.

Mr. Williams works to address a variety of critical issues, including the health and safety of Indigenous communities, the epidemic of Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women, protecting traditional hunting, fishing, and gathering rights, cultural preservation, suicide prevention, promoting sobriety, and environmental protection in the face of industrialization and climate change. His memoir, Racing to Recovery, inspires readers to face life challenges with courage and support others who struggle. “Mike Williams, Sr., is the embodiment of the late Congressman John Lewis’s urging to ‘make good trouble’ in bringing about positive change,” said NAS Program Coordinator Bonnie Brown.

Mr. Williams is a Chemawa Indian boarding school graduate and a Vietnam-era US Army veteran. He studied behavioral health counseling at Kuskokwim Community College and the University of Alaska. He is often a media source on important national and international news such as the 2025 typhoon that displaced entire Native villages in southwestern Alaska. 

During his WVU visit Mr. Williams will give presentations to a host of classes and meet with student organizations. His residency is hosted by the Native American Studies Program in the Eberly College of Arts & Sciences and co-sponsored by the Leadership Studies Program, the Department of Geology and Geography, the School of Natural Resources and the Environment, and the WVU Humanities Center, with funds from the Reyer Visiting Lecture Program for Native American Studies.        

Musher and team of sled dogs in front of snow-covered, purple sunset mountains
Iditarod musher Mike Williams, Sr. and his team cross Finger Lake with the beautiful alpenglow lit mountains in the background. Photo used with permission, Jeff Schultz Photography. 

More about Mike Williams, Sr.

Williams grew up in the Alaska Native Community of Akiak, learning traditional Indigenous subsistence skills and culture. Leaving home to attend Chemawa Indian Boarding School in Oregon, he was an outstanding high school athlete and his class president, graduating in 1972. 

After losing six of his brothers to suicide and alcohol-related deaths, Williams became an advocate for sober living and a traditional lifestyle focused on Indigenous culture and language. He used the challenging Iditarod dogsled race to promote a message of sobriety, winning the race’s "Most Inspirational Musher" award three times. As an advocate for Indigenous education, Williams is a longtime board member for the Yupiit School District and served on the Alaska State Board of Education. He served as an advisor to a veterinary program offered by the University of Alaska-Fairbanks and Colorado State University to provide services to communities in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta area.

NAS elder-in-residence and wife in the front with four WVU students in the back.
Mike & Maggie Williams of the Yup'ik Native Community of Akiak, Alaska with Native American Studies minors Kiana Luevano, Zeke Bailey, Eli Mallow, and Laci Gaidis, in Seattle for the 2025 National Congress of American Indians. 

Legacy of Distinguished Residency Participants:

In the past several years, with generous support from the Carolyn Reyer Endowment for Native American Studies, the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences, and others, the NAS program has flourished with the participation of these outstanding individuals:

  • 2026 Mike Williams, Sr. (Yup'ik) "Land, Water, Subsistence: Native Alaskan Sovereignty and Stewardship"
  • 2025 Susan Devan Harness (Confederated Salish & Kootenai Tribes),  "Racialized : Power Structures in American Indian Transracial Adoption"
  • 2024 Jean Whitehorse (Navajo Nation), "Amá - the Navajo Word for Mother"
  • 2022 Joy Harjo (Muscogee, Creek Nation) "An Evening with U.S. Poet Laureate joy Harjo"
  • 2021 Mervyn L. Tano, President, International Institute for Indigenous Resource Management: "Dealing with Climate Change: Everything is Connected, Tribal Approaches to Adaptation," "Reclaiming Our Spaces: Indigenizing the Museum of the Future," and "Boundary Organizations: Universities, Indigenous Organizations, & Native Scientists as Nation Builders"
  • 2019 William Gollnick (Oneida Nation) "Traveling the Red Roads: Defining the Map"
  • 2018 Margaret Pearce, Ph.D. (Citizen Potawatomi Nation) Cartographer, Visiting Scholar presentation: “Imagination, Memory, and Engagement: Expressing Indigenous Geographies  with Cartographic Language”  
  • 2017 David Archambault, II, Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chairman, "Standing with Standing Rock: Why Justice Looks Different in Indian Country"
  • 2016 Ada Deer (Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin), former Assistant Secretary of the Federal Bureau of Indian Affairs, former Menominee Chair, social worker, activist, "From Reservation Cabin to the Corridors of Power: Changing our World from Within"
  • 2015 Charlie Soap (Cherokee Nation) filmmaker, photographer, community organizer, "The Cherokee Word for Water"
  • 2014 (Writer-in-Residence) Diane Glancy, author, filmmaker, playright, "The Dream of a Broken Field"
  • 2013 Walter Echo-Hawk (Pawnee), tribal Supreme Court Judge, Native American Rights Attorney, and author of  In the Courts of the Conqueror: The Ten Worst Indian Law Cases Ever Decided, and In the Light of Justice: The Rise of Human Rights in Native America and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
  • 2011 Gerard Baker (Mandan, Hidatsa), his lecture, “From Log House to Rushmore,” told story of his rise through the ranks of the National Parks Service and his role as Superintendent of Mt. Rushmore National Monument, as well as Little Bighorn National Battlefield and other important Native American historic sites.
  • 2010 Suzan Shown Harjo (Cheyenne, Hodulgee Muscogee), Native Rights Advocate, writer, poet, artist and curator…Director of the Morningstar Institute, "Protecting and Respecting our Ancestors: the Making of the National Museum of the American Indian"
  • 2009 Leader-in-Residence Tex Hall (Mandan, Hidatsa), former president of the National Congress of American Indians, served multiple terms as Chair of the Mandan-Hidatsa-Arikara Nation, "Today in Indian Country"
  • 2008 Leslie Marmom Silko (Laguna Pueblo), award-winning author of such works as  The Man to Send Rain Clouds, Laguna Woman, Ceremony, Almanac of the Dead, Gardens in the Dunes, Ocean Story _(a novella),  and her memoir, The Turquoise Ledge._
  • 2007 John EchoHawk (Pawnee), Executive Director of the Native American Rights Fund, addressed the Cobell case and other important legal issues facing Native Americans.
  • 2006 Dr. Henrietta Mann, Ph.D. (Cheyenne), public lecture, “Is Nothing Sacred? Native American Views on Reverence and Connection”
  • 2005 Chief Oren Lyons, Faithkeeper of the Turtle Clan, Onondaga Nation, Haudenosaunee, Six Nations – Iroquois Confederacy, public lecture, “Cowboys and Indians: Will it Ever End? Ask Mother Earth”
  • 2004 LaDonna Harris, (Comanche), public lecture, “Indigeneity: Indigenous Leadership in the Face of Global Change”
  • 2003 Peterson Zah, former Chairman and Tribal President of the Navajo Nation, public lecture, “Winds of Change in Indian Country”
  • 2002 Angaangaq Lyberth, (Inuk), public lecture, “Melting the Ice in the Heart of Man”