How The Nooni Project Helps Reclaim Breastfeeding in Indigenous Communities

The Nooni Project is a project designed by PhD student Angie Sanchez and funded by a grant from the Michigan Health Endowment Fund. Nooni is the Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe) word for "She/he suckles at the breast." Reclaiming breastfeeding as ceremony, as tradition in Indigenous communities is a method of healing ourselves and our children from hundreds of years of colonization and attempted genocide.

Objectives:
1. Historical trauma: how it's passed down, how it manifests itself
2. What is the Nooni Project
3. How geographies (time and place) intersect to affect breastfeeding rates within communities
4. How to serve Indigenous communities in breastfeeding and beyond.

Link To Share: bit.ly/SDCBCTheNooniProject

Speaker:
Angie Sanchez is Crane Clan Ojibway and Odawa from Michigan. She is a 4th year PhD student in the Department of Geography, Environment and Spatial Sciences at Michigan State University. She holds a BA in Communications as well as an MBA, both from MSU. Angie studies health & medical geography, where her research focuses on increasing access to breastfeeding support resources in Indigenous communities. During her first year as a PhD student, she was awarded a Michigan Health Endowment Fund grant of $338,000 to bring the Indigenous Breastfeeding Counselor Training program to 6 different Indigenous communities in Michigan, and in 2022 helped author a grant in the amount of $100,000 to collaborate with Michigan Breastfeeding Network to help organize the Sacred Bundle Birth Worker Collective and position them as a non-profit and single source for birth work support for Indigenous people in the state of Michigan.