LOUISA KAKIANAAQ RILEY

“I have been working with families for a long time, I am supposed to be retired. [Laughs] I worked for 13 years with the tribe in Utqiagvik, as a family advocate, as an investigator for domestic violence and sexual assault. I helped develop the juvenile court there. Most of my life, I have been proactive, my motto is, ‘If there is a problem, there is always a solution.’ You can’t do it alone, it takes a whole community to make the community the way it should be. I have been a certified interpreter for the State of Alaska in the court system. So, I have always been involved with families. If I wasn’t teaching, I was transcribing or translating. I have gone to court, several times, for the benefit, to start getting back into our grassroots, to start healing for our Native families. Our ways are better to use, to deal with situations, we have to take control of our own identity.” — Louisa Kakianaaq Riley is Inupiaq and lives in Anaktukuk Pass.