Barbie’s Village celebrates Indigenous People’s Day with traditional food and music

Young singers and drummers from the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde filled the air with original songs, their voices and rhythms setting the tone for an afternoon full of culture and community.

The group opened with a song called “Giving Thanks” to honor Indigenous Peoples Day on Monday afternoon in Barbie Village. The celebration, held on the grounds of the former Laurelhurst Presbyterian Church, was a collaboration between the Future Generation Collaborative and the Portland Indigenous Marketplace that offered attendees a free meal, a vendor market and a children’s powwow.

“So today, it’s up to us, first and foremost, to come together as a Native community and celebrate who we are,” said Jillene Joseph, engagement coordinator for the Future Generations Collaborative. “This is to help instill pride.”

Another key aspect of the event was coming together to share traditional foods while educating attendees about Indigenous Peoples Day and the organizations that made the celebration possible, Joseph said. For many, Indigenous Peoples Day is a significant occasion to recognize and honor the heritage, culture and collective identity of Indigenous communities.

“Every day, living indigenous peoples, especially Native American communities, are never really considered,” said Lluvia Merello, executive director of the Portland Indigenous Marketplace. “So for me, it’s really about visibility.”

The Portland Indigenous Marketplace has been part of the celebration since 2019, Merello said. The organization supports Indigenous artists with a variety of markets throughout the year that offer barrier-free and culturally respectful spaces.

Their support in organizing the vendor market brought a dozen indigenous vendors to the event, selling jewelry, herbs, baked goods, clothing and other handmade items.

“They call it Indigenous People’s Day, but it’s really just a day of resilience,” said Denell Broncho, an event attendee. “It’s a day of reckoning, a day of celebration.”

Broncho sat down with his grandfather, Ed Edmo, a storyteller and elder who was sharing his poems detailing his experiences in Portland with market-goers.

“He has overcome many obstacles and challenges in life, and he has documented them in poems,” Broncho said. “So I’m very proud of him.”

One of the main reasons Future Generations Collaborative was founded in 2012 was to address the widespread impacts of trauma in Indigenous communities.

“Native people have faced a lot of trauma, including historical trauma and modern trauma, which manifests itself through pain and distress and they don’t necessarily have the skills to deal with it in a healthy way,” said Broncho.

The organization began by focusing on traditional values, collaborative efforts, and the prevention of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, while supporting those affected by the disorder and other traumas.

“Our mission began to expand as an organization to include addressing early childhood,” Joseph said. “It was expanded to include addressing other public health issues as well.”

In 2022, the organization’s leaders made the decision to apply to become a non-profit organization. They now provide comprehensive services to the Indigenous community with multi-generational education, community-driven engagement, Indigenous research and policy initiatives. Its community-led approach aims to address the root causes of health inequities facing Native communities.

In March of this year, they acquired the land that once housed Laurelhurst Presbyterian Church, where they plan to build Barbie’s Village, a small home community and early childhood center designed to support unhoused Indigenous families.

The village is named after Barbie Jackson Chills, a member of the Warm Springs Confederated Tribes and a key figure in community work with the Future Generations Collaborative. After she died in 2017 of a brain aneurysm, the organization created the Barbie’s Village vision to honor her legacy. The village aims to provide stable housing, early childhood services, access to medical and dental care and other support services for the community.

“So the first phase was getting the building,” Joseph said. “Now the second phase is the reform of the building. So once we get a little further on the renovations, phase three begins, which is fundraising for the tiny houses.”

The nonprofit hopes to have six tiny houses built by next year and is in the process of creating an informal list of families in need of housing, prioritizing Native women with young children.

“What we’re doing as a community and as a people is we’re trying to help each other heal,” Joseph said. “And non-Native people can do the same because healing has to happen so that racism, this white supremacy, can end.”