Photo credit: Nate Ryan for The Guardian
ABOUT DANA
A lineal descendant of the Sisseton-Wahpeton and Mdewakanton Dakota tribes and lifetime Minnesota native, Dana has worked for nearly a decade within the food sovereignty movement. She has engaged extensively throughout tribal communities, promoting critical ways to improve food access and implementing strategies to do the most possible good as a social entrepreneur.
As former co-owner and Chief Operating Officer of The Sioux Chef, she managed all business development strategies for the company. In July 2021, Dana co-founded Owamni by The Sioux Chef, Minnesota’s first full-service Indigenous restaurant. Owamni received the James Beard Award for Best New Restaurant in the U.S. in June 2022. Their team was able to name Owamni Restaurant based on the location, thanks to a book that was published called Where the Waters Gather and the Rivers Meet, by Paul Durand. This book was dedicated to Clem Felix, Dana’s grandfather. He was the Dakota speaker who helped with the creation of this document to preserve the authentic native names of the Dakota Territory.
Dana also co-founded the nonprofit NĀTIFS (North American Traditional Indigenous Food Systems). Through NĀTIFS, she developed health and wellness initiatives focused on addressing and treating ancestral trauma through decolonized perspectives of honoring and leveraging Indigenous wisdom. Dana stepped away from NāTIFS in 2023 to pursue other passions within the food, wellness, and entrepreneurial social impact space.
Dana served as a founding member on the leadership committee of the James Beard Foundation Investment Fund for Black and Indigenous Americans, and currently sits on the board of directors of the nonprofit Friends of the Falls.
An accomplished songwriter and guitarist, Dana was a founding member and lead singer with Strawdogs, Hot Head Fiasco, and The Minor Planets. As a working musician and producer through much of her life, Dana has released seven albums.
DAKOTA LINEAL DESCENDENCY
Dana is the granddaughter of Clem Felix, a Mdewakanton, Sisseton/Wahpeton, Anishinaabe, and French descendant who was a member of the Santee Sioux Nation. His contributions to preserving Dakota language and place names are invaluable. The book Where the Waters Gather and the Rivers Meet is a rare and exceptional atlas, which includes important storytelling of Dakota Indigenous history.
The stories of the Felix and Coursoulle families are documented thanks to family members that have researched and advocated for recogition of their Indigeneity and for our ancestors to be remembered. The Felix family line was one of the subjects of the book Spirit Car by Diane Wilson, a relative of Dana’s.
Clem was also able to write down the harrowing stories of his own grandfather, whose Dakota name was Hinhankaga (The Owl). This document, The Ordeal of Hinhankaga, is preserved at the Minnesota Historical Society. It remembers the day of the “Dakota Uprising” and helps to shed light on the personal experiences of those enduring colonial genocide.
This ancestry information documents Dana’s maternal bloodline which includes her grandmother, Clem’s wife Florence who was French and Irish. Dana’s father was 100% Scandinavian.
Dedication from “Where the Waters Gather and the Rivers Meet” by Paul C. Durand.
