Rematriated Voices puts Haudenosaunee knowledge on TV-and students behind the camera
The email looked simple enough: a call for student production assistants. A weekend shoot in the Adirondacks. But for Syracuse student Ricana Walker '27, it became something bigger-learning the story of the land she walks on, while working a professional set by the lake, cables coiled on stone and cameras humming to life.
The team was filming Rematriated Voices With Michelle Schenandoah, a five-part talk show and podcast now airing on PBS stations and Indigenous radio. It's hosted by Michelle Schenandoah G'19-founder of Rematriation and a member of the Oneida Nation Wolf Clan-who wanted a format that carries Indigenous conversations beyond one room and one moment.
"A lot of our people are invited into spaces to speak on these topics, but you're limited to whoever's in the room at that time," Schenandoah told me. "By creating this talk show and podcast series, it allows the information and dialogue to expand further into the world."
Three years led to that weekend at Minnowbrook Conference Center. The project grew out of an earlier university-backed audio series about Haudenosaunee history and presence. The idea this time: keep the rigor, add a living, visual space where guests could sit, breathe, and tell the stories you rarely hear in textbooks.
How the production worked
Producer Jim O'Connor pulled in alumni, students, faculty and staff; Orange Television Network helped recruit student camera ops; and a trio of storytelling consultants-including Mohawk filmmaker Katsitsionni Fox and University Ombuds Neal Powless (movies and tv series)-kept the work rooted in the values the show talks about on camera. It wasn't a token student gig; it was a real set with real stakes.
Walker ran one of three cameras on interviews that lasted two to three hours, later cut into clean one-hour episodes. "I've worked on student sets, but obviously things are more serious on a professional set," she said. "I definitely gained a better understanding of production workflows."
Between takes, students listened. Mohawk Bear Clan Mother Louise "Mommabear" McDonald Herne. Botanist and author Robin Wall Kimmerer (movies and tv series). Historian Sally Roesch Wagner (movies and tv series)-who died in June-talking about how ideas from Haudenosaunee women shaped early American suffragists. Big themes, grounded in lived experience.
What the five episodes cover
- The Doctrine of Discovery and why it still touches law and life
- Relationships with the living world-more than "nature," it's kinship
- Haudenosaunee governance and its influence on American democracy
- Indigenous women's authority and how suffragists took notes
- Matrilineal men who stand empowered alongside women leaders
Here's the part that sticks with you: the set wasn't flashy. Chairs, blankets, quiet water behind the guests. No crowd noises. Just voices you lean into-like you would around a kitchen table-saying things that make you rethink what you learned in school.
Why TV folks should pay attention
- It's got distribution. The series premiered on WCNY-TV and is now carried on PBS stations in Syracuse, Rochester and Watertown, plus two national Indigenous radio shows including Native Voice One. The podcast version is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and YouTube.
- It has a built-in pipeline. The production model blends professional crew and trained students, which means more shoots are doable without ballooning budgets.
- It fills a real gap. Viewers are hungry for context on Indigenous history and present-day leadership-told by the people (movies and tv series) living it, not explained from afar.
"The opportunity to collaborate with Rematriation to produce this project and amplify the significance of Indigenous matrilineality has been a formative one," O'Connor said. And you could see it on set. Students weren't just shadowing; they were contributing.
Since then, Walker's had PBS credits to add to her reel. But the deeper shift was personal. "It really opened my eyes," she told me. "Now I feel like I've gained a lot more insight on the Haudenosaunee people."
If you cover talk series or program acquisitions, here's what this could mean: there's an audience for thoughtful, slower TV that treats Indigenous knowledge as present tense-not a footnote. And if your station is looking for conversation that actually teaches, not lectures, this is the kind of show that earns its hour.
Where to find it is simple: episodes air on regional PBS, stream as a podcast on major platforms, and live online. The next question is the interesting one-who picks it up next, and how many more conversations we get to hear.
