New Songs Rising Initiative
Uplifting and resourcing Indigenous girls
The New Songs Rising Initiative is a partnership between Grantmakers for Girls of Color and Seventh Generation Fund for Indigenous People’s Thriving Women’s Program. This initiative expands opportunities for Indigenous girls through grantmaking, convening and community building, and mentorship and peer support, with a specific emphasis on Indigenous cultural work.
Of the $356 million in foundation dollars made available for women and girls of color, only 2.6% specifically benefit Indigenous women and girls. The New Songs Rising Initiative aims to address that funding gap and resource Indigenous girls and their communities with abundance and intention.
Funding priorities include: multi-generational healing and organizing amongst Indigenous girls and women; advancing the capacity of Indigenous girls and women to resist state and colonial violence and gender-based violence particularly impacting Indigenous girls and women; art, music, and poetry to advance healing, safety, visibility, and movement-building for Indigenous girls and women.
In our first round of grantmaking distributed in July 2021, we had the honor of supporting eight Indigenous organizations. Four of these projects and organizations are funded by the New Songs Rising Initiative at G4GC, and four are supported by Seventh Generation Fund For Indigenous People’s Grants for Girls Vitality, which sits within the Thriving Women’s Program. The grantees from Seventh Generation Fund For Indigenous Peoples’ Grants for Girls’ Vitality are:
- Dances with Words, Emerging Poets Fellowship, First Peoples Fund
- Pueblo Action Alliance
- Ho’opae Pono Peace Project
- Iakionhnhehkwen (We Sustain Life)
The grantees for G4GC’s New Songs Rising Initiative are:
These grantees are all dedicated to restoring health, security, and abundance to their communities. The funding will support the empowerment of Indigenous women and girls in their efforts to foster cultural learning and healing, address the intersections of gender, climate, economic, and education justice, and support multigenerational organizing.
Photo credit: Hmong American Women’s Association
What do we hope to do?
- Move financial resources to organizations and tax-exempt Tribal entities serving and supporting Native/Indigenous girls, especially those led by Native/Indigenous women and girls
- Support the skill-building and network-building among Native/Indigenous women and girls leading these organizations and efforts
- Supporting research, particularly participatory research, that fills data gaps about how best to support the sovereignty and organizing power of Native/Indigenous women and girls
- Create a container for conversations and political education between non-Native and other women and girls of color about how to move in solidarity with one another towards collective liberation
- Facilitate opportunities for funders to discuss how to decolonize philanthropic practices in order to mitigate or repair harm done to Native/Indigenous communities
- Provide visibility for powerful work being led by Native/Indigenous girls for other funders and philanthropic colleagues
HOW CAN YOU GET INVOLVED AND FIND OUT MORE?
Photo credit: Protect the Sacred
Learn more!
Read about it
Read about how New Songs Rising is centering Indigenous girls in Inside Philanthropy
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