Yá’át’ééh! I am a Diné scholar, teacher, weaver, wife, and mom whose home base is in Tsaile, Arizona. After 15 years at my tribal college I am excited to start my new position as a tenured Associate Professor of Native American Studies at the University of California, Davis. You read that right - Rez to R1!

My scholarship begins close to home.

I write and teach about Indigenous relationships with animals, cultural arts, Native American and Indigenous Studies, and the complicated ways Indigenous knowledge moves through classrooms, communities, families, and everyday life. My forthcoming book, Today, We Butcher: Lessons from Sheep on Life, Death, and Re-Membering, grows from many of those relationships—especially the teachings that emerge among Diné people and sheep.

But my work does not end when I leave the classroom.

I weave. I tend sheep. I help my husband, silversmith Carlon P. Ami II, with his art business. And, most importantly, together we are raising two Táchii’nii boys to know where they come from and to carry that knowledge wherever their futures take them.

These aren't separate parts of my life. They are the reason I research what I research and teach the way I teach -always positionality-based, always geographically influenced, always me.

Explore my writing and research, teaching, or Dismembering blog to see what I’m working on now.

Dóone’é nishlínígíí éí Táchii’nii nishlí, Bilagáana báshíshchíín, T’ó’aheedl’ííníí dashicheii, Bilagáana dashinálí. Shí éí Christine Ami da shijiní. Ak’otéego Diné asdzaan nishlí.