Henrietta Mann

Henrietta Mann is a professor emeritus of Native American Studies, founding recipient of the Montana State University Katz Endowed Chair in Native American Studies and a founding and active member of MSU's Council of Elders. She is a Cheyenne enrolled in the Cheyenne-Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma and taught at the University of Montana, Missoula for 28 years where she was a professor of Native American studies. She also has taught at the University of California, Berkeley, Harvard University and Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, Kansas. Mann has served as director of the Office of Indian Education Programs and deputy to the assistant secretary for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. She also was the national coordinator of the American Indian Religious Freedom Act Coalition for the Association of American Indian Affairs. In 1991, Rolling Stone Magazine named her one of 10 leading professors in the nation. She has been an interviewee and consultant for several television and movie productions and has lectured throughout the United States as well as in Mexico, Canada, Germany, Italy and New Zealand. Mann is still crisscrossing the United States teaching, speaking and advocating for Native American education.

Henrietta Mann is often called the Native American Maya Angelou and is a founding and active member of MSU’s Council of Elders.