You don’t need to know every detail before you come. Powwows are welcoming, and you’ll learn by watching, listening, and following the lead of others. These simple guidelines will help you feel comfortable and show respect:

• Grand Entry and Honor Songs: Please rise and remove hats during Grand Entry, honor songs, the flag song, and veteran songs.

• Follow the Emcee: The emcee will explain what’s happening throughout the day. Listen for announcements—they’ll guide you on when to stand, when photos are allowed, and when everyone is invited to dance.

• The Arena: The arena floor is sacred and reserved for dancers. Please don’t enter unless invited, such as during intertribals. Do not cut across the arena, and please keep food and drinks outside of it. Pets are not allowed in the arena.

• Photos and Video: Feel free to take photos and video, but some songs or dances should not be recorded. The emcee will let you know—when in doubt, ask.

• Respect Dancers and Regalia: Regalia is deeply personal and often handmade. Please do not touch a dancer’s regalia, beadwork, feathers, or other items without permission.

• Respect the Drum: The drum and drum group’s belongings are sacred. Do not touch or handle them unless you’re invited.

• Seating: General seating is open to everyone, but leave the first rows near the arena for elders, singers, and dancers.

• Children: Kids are welcome, but please keep them supervised, especially near the arena, so dancers can move safely.

• Family-Friendly and Smoke-Free: Powwows are alcohol-, drug-, and smoke-free events. Smoking and vaping are not allowed in the arena or vendor areas.

• Support the Vendors: Buying food or artwork from Native vendors is one of the best ways to show respect and support.

Above all: be respectful, follow the emcee, and enjoy yourself. If you’re unsure, watch what others do or ask politely—our community will be glad to guide you.

Unstoppable Voices is how we take that back.

With support from Healing Illinois, the American Indian Center launched the Unstoppable Voices Project to equip Native community members with the tools and support to tell their own stories—authentically, powerfully, and without outside interpretation.

This isn’t just a creative workshop. It’s an investment in narrative sovereignty.

Over the course of this year, participants have taken part in five storytelling tracks—photography, videography, podcasting, oral storytelling, and creative writing. Led by Native artists, journalists, and cultural workers, these workshops are designed to be hands-on and transformational. Participants learn the technical skills to record, edit, and share their work—but more importantly, they connect with their voice, their community, and each other.

Workshops are intentionally intergenerational and inclusive. Youth work alongside elders. First-time storytellers sit with seasoned artists. Some stories are joyful. Others are raw and unflinching. All are real. And every single one is told by someone with the right to tell it.

At Unstoppable Voices: Telling the Stories That Heal Us, you’ll get to see and hear these stories for yourself. In our pop-up art gallery, you’ll walk among powerful images taken by community members. You’ll hear podcast excerpts layered with laughter, vulnerability, and truth. You’ll experience short films that offer glimpses into lived Native realities—and you’ll meet the people behind the stories.

This work matters. Not just because it heals those who tell the stories, but because it builds understanding, connection, and change for those who listen.

The truth is, storytelling has always been part of who we are as Native people. We’ve used it to pass down knowledge, protect memory, and find strength in hard times. What Unstoppable Voices does is help restore the space and support to do that work on our own terms—with dignity, intention, and pride.

And we’re just getting started.

With your support, this project can grow. We want to reach more Native storytellers across Chicago. We want to offer deeper workshops, creative stipends, mentorship opportunities, and lasting platforms where these stories can live beyond the gala—on stages, in classrooms, in podcasts, in film festivals, and in communities where they will make a difference.

Because when we tell our stories in our own voice, we do more than reclaim the narrative—we shape the future.