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This year, for Native American Heritage Month, we spotlight organizations that are led by or serve Native American individuals and communities. Throughout the country, groups like the ones featured below are building support structures for LGBTQ+ and 2-Spirit tribal members and other Indigenous folks.

Southwest Indigenous Women’s Coalition

Southwest Indigenous Women’s Coalition (SWIWC) works to create safe indigenous communities by supporting tribes to increase their capacity to address and respond to violence through education, training, technical assistance, policy advocacy, and culturally sensitive supportive services. SWIWC serves all 22 tribes in Arizona. SWIWC also has a Native LGBTQ/2S Advisory Council to advise the SWIWC staff and Governing board on the best ways to educate, support, and empower Native communities to increase awareness, safety, healing, justice, and resources for the LGBTQ/2S+ community. The LGBTQ/2S Advisory Council offers guidance on training and technical assistance (T/TA) approaches, data inclusion, resource development/funding opportunities, policy development, and tribal and on-site trainings with activities that come directly from the voices and presence of the LGBTQ/2S+ community.

The Indigenous Peoples Task Force was founded to develop and implement culturally-appropriate HIV education and direct services to the Native community in Minnesota. The Indigenous Peoples Task force works to strengthen the wellness of communities and restore relationships between individuals and the relationship people have with the earth. Through their HIV Program, the Indigenous Peoples Task Force supports all people living on Reservations and in Greater Minnesota to navigate housing and medical care through services that are rooted in indigenous ways of knowing and healing.

Navajo Nation Pride/Diné Pride is the largest indigenous LGBTQ/2S+ pride. Navajo Nation Pride/Diné Pride honors and celebrates the LGBTQ/2S+ community while reaffirming the sacredness of their identities. Diné Pride reintroduces the traditional knowledge and teachings that kept LGBTQ/2S+ individuals safe and revered at one point in history.

National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center 

The National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center (NIWRC) provides national leadership to end violence against American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian women by supporting culturally grounded, grassroots advocacy. NIWRC develops resources and training opportunities to support Tribes, grassroots advocates, and survivors in prioritizing the safety of Native women and their children and requiring accountability of offenders and communities.
The Montana-based organization offers LGBTQ/2S+ focused toolkits and webinars.

Bay Area American Indian Two-Spirits (BAAITS) is a community-based volunteer organization that exists to restore and recover the role of Two-Spirit people within the American Indian/First Nations community. BAAITS creates a safe environment for Two-Spirit people to socialize and explore their heritage through culturally relevant activities for LGBTQ/2S+ individuals of Native American ancestry, including an annual powwow.

Native Movement

Alaska-based Native Movement supports grassroots-led projects that dismantle oppressive systems for all and ensure social justice, Indigenous Peoples’ rights, and the rights of Mother Earth. Native Movement is committed to supporting community initiatives toward personal and communal healing, including gender justice. Native Movement demands justice for the thousands of missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls, and 2-Spirit people and works to support healing by acknowledging the correlation between violence against the earth and gender-based violence.