Olivia Chumacero

Native American liaison (University Proffesor)

Olivia Chumacero’s enduring commitment has been to work with the peoples who are close to Earth. Her inspirational theatre and literary endeavors have taken her around the world, constructing socially conscious projects with youth and under privileged communities.

Her well honed communication skills as writer/director/poet have served her life’s mission of; giving a voice to youth, adults and elders who walk the red road.

Ms. Chumacero attributes her unabated desire to create change for the betterment of people and Earth alike, to her grandmother’s native traditional teachings and her beginnings , as a migrant farm-worker.

Olivia has had the privilege of working with the Guaraní tribe in South America, the Maya Quiché in Guatemala, the Lacandón in Chiapas, the Mexicas of central Mexico, the Mohawk in up-state New York, the Yokut, Nez Perce, and Chumash in California, the Navajo in New Mexico, and the Mongolians in the Dunhuang area of China. She was born into the deer-clan and her people are known as the Raramuri from the Sierras of Chihuahua, Mexico.

As a professor at UC Santa Barbara, and UC Riverside and through out various other international campuses such as the Sorbonne in Paris, Olivia always distinguished herself for the innovative and relevant social content of her subject matter.