Anjelica Lindsey to Join Oklahoma Center for the Humanities’ “Art as Sovereignty” Symposium as Panelist
Anjelica Lindsey, composer, violinist, recording artist, and enrolled citizen of the Cherokee Nation, will participate in the Oklahoma Center for the Humanities’ “Art as Sovereignty” Symposium on September 11–12, 2026, in Tulsa. Lindsey was named a 2025–2026 Public Fellow of the Oklahoma Center for the Humanities, and her participation in the symposium continues her engagement with the University of Tulsa’s Oklahoma Center for the Humanities and its work examining Indigenous art, culture, and sovereignty.
The University of Tulsa’s Oklahoma Center for the Humanities is hosting the two-day symposium, with programming taking place at 101 Archer and an additional discussion at Magic City Books. The symposium considers Indigenous sovereignty through art in its many forms, asking who creates Indigenous art, who consumes and benefits from it, and how artistic practices function as expressions of cultural continuity and sovereignty.
Lindsey will appear at 2:30 p.m. on Saturday, September 12, for the panel “Take Your Medicine: Music and Ceremonial Preservation.” She will be joined by Frank Waln (Sicangu Lakota), Aryn Ward (Mvskoke), and Richard York (Cherokee Nation), with the discussion moderated by Gerald Torres of Yale University.
The panel will examine music and cultural preservation through the perspectives of Indigenous musicians and cultural practitioners. Lindsey’s participation reflects her work as a Cherokee composer developing contemporary classical music through Cherokee language, history, identity, and lived experience.
The panel will also feature Aryn Ward, a Mvskoke composer and founder of the Good Medicine Indigenous Music Festival. In October 2026, Lindsey will make her symphonic debut at the Good Medicine Indigenous Music Festival in Houston with the Houston Cougar Camerata Symphony Orchestra.
The symposium opens Friday, September 11, with opening remarks from Sean Latham of the University of Tulsa, followed by a keynote address, “Sovereignty and the Aesthetic,” by Gerald Torres of Yale University. The evening continues with a panel on body, tattoo, and fashion as preservation through mobility, followed by an Indigenous fashion show presented by Indigichic and Native Fashion Arts Collective co-founders Jessica Harjo and Veronica Pipestem, with a live performance by Frank Waln.
Saturday’s programming includes a panel and workshop on Indigenous typography and story, a lunch discussion with Frybread Factory owners William and Annette Juethje, a typography workshop led by Chris Skillern, and the afternoon music and ceremonial preservation panel featuring Lindsey. The symposium concludes with an Indigenous Horror discussion at Magic City Books featuring Jessica Doe in conversation with the Hon. Greg Bigler.
The “Art as Sovereignty” Symposium is free and open to the public. Registration is encouraged but not required.
“Art as Sovereignty” Symposium
September 11–12, 2026
101 Archer
101 E. Archer St.
Tulsa, Oklahoma
Full symposium information from the Oklahoma Center for the Humanities
