DEAR ALASKA,

My goal for Dear Alaska, is to find myself; I am Tlingit, but what does it really mean to be Indigenous? Indigeneity is constantly portrayed as something that is stuck in the past and is therefore extinct in modern times, and my film will directly combat this myth and reclaim a space for Indigenous Peoples. I often feel like I am never truly understood or seen as I have come across many misguided assumptions about me. This documentary provides an opportunity for me to explain that I am Tlingit without having to forcefully shove it in people’s faces, immersing in the traditional and contemporary life of my Tlingit people in Alaska/Canada as well as other Natives in the San Diego area. Dear Alaska, is such an important start to my filmmaking career because it is both an exploration of the self and an essential reclaiming from the dominant, colonial narratives to achieve visual sovereignty that uplifts Indigenous communities and spreads our necessary truths to a colonized society.