2007 Internships

2007 Dancing Hawk Internship Application
Please email your applications to: kiliii (at) dancinghawk (dot) com.



Hello everyone,

I excited and proud to announce our new Dancing Hawk internships! They are much revised from previous years and really a new approach for me.

Our vision is a community-oriented approach to re-indigenizing, or developing an indigenous relationship to the land in the greater Portland area, as well as cultivating an indigenous attitude towards community.

Some of the skills we may be working on during the internship:

Awareness: Birdsong, Plant identification, Waterway navigation, Understanding weather and currents and tides, Regional ecology, Permaculture principles, Understanding Privelege, Learning Chinook Jargon.
Physical: Basketry, Fiber Arts, Edible Plants, Edible Seafoods, Kayak-Building, Fishing, Hunting, Doubleball, Bowmaking, Food Preservation, Hidetanning, Garment Making, Firemaking, Shelter-building.
Community: Community participation, Community organizing, Ambassadorship, Connecting with Native communities, Mentoring, Outreach, Peacemaking.
Spiritual: Creating Ceremonial space, Sacred Fire, Giving thanks, Slowing down, Looking ahead and behind seven generations
Other Opportunities: Working with community elders, attending primitive skills and native gatherings.

• Available to those between 17 and 22 years of age. I believe this is extremely important for developing a sustainable mentorship model. I am also open to recent college graduates.
• Free tuition. This means that there is no monetary cost for the intership itself. However, this does not include housing, food, or material costs, etc...
• Community-centered. Interns are responsible for organizing and maintaining community activities in concert with the Ancestral Lifewayscommunity in Portland.
• Based in urban Portland, Oregon. Because of the community focus, the interns live in and are based in the city of Portland.
• Year-long commitment. I am asking for a 4 season commitment to a seasonal program, although the format will be very open to traveling and breaks. I am also asking for a commitment to learning the entire indigenous road, not just the easy and attractive parts.
• You get out of it what you put in. The intership is of a guided format, but I will not ask anybody to put energy into an area they are not passionate about. You must be ready to motivate yourself.
• Cultural awareness. Interns will be active in areas that are part of the greater community as well, such as permaculture, natural building, oppression activism.
• Flexibility. Interns will have a loose schedule, with two month-long breaks and space for smaller breaks as well.
• Gender and cultural balance. Interns will be chosen to facilitate a balanced community situation, both in gender, minority status, and background. I anticipate between four and six interns.


• Intership living situation. There will be a communal living situation for all the interns together. The interns will be responsible for finding a communal house in NE Portland and sharing the space and rent and other needs (spiritual, emotional) involved.
• Officially starts in early October. This is to coincide with the fall salmon run and the hunter-gatherer intensive course.
• Anticipate inexpensive but not money-free living. You may spend little money on food and other items, but there will be occasional things that you will need money for, not the least of which might be materials to build a skin kayak. Also, remember that you are living in a city and so it always costs more to live here.
• Work is somewhat available through sister organizations. Interns are free to work (and likely will) to support themselves for rent and food, and to support that there are opportunities here through TrackersNW and other programs to make some money. Even so, the financial responsibility is yours.
• You must be self-sustainable. The internship program is not a babysitting group, although we will always be there to support each other.
• Honestry with yourself. I ask that when you make this commitment, you first honestly ask yourself what your motivations are, and whether you are committed to taking a sometimes joyful and sometimes painful road towards a new culture that strives to have an indigenous relationship with the land and each other.

We will be making decisions on intern positions based on applications recieved by a certain date.
1) Two positions by June 1st
2) Two positions by August 1st
3) Two positions by September 24th

If you interested in this program and have read and understand the guidelines above (knowing that they are mutable), then feel free to send me an Application for the 2007 Dancing Hawk Internship.

My email address is kiliii (at) dancinghawk (dot) com.


Sincerely, Kiliii Yu, Dancing Hawk Hunter-Gatherer Lifeways.


Practicing Kayak Rolls at the pool.


By the fire with elder Jon Young.


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


The morel of this story-- don't try this without positive identification.





Community is when nine people under a tarp in an ice storm can still have fun.