Rate My Professor Joely Proudfit

Joely Proudfit, Ph.D., a descendant of the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians, serves as Professor and Department Chair of American Indian Studies at California State University, San Marcos (CSUSM), where she joined the faculty in fall 2008. She is also the Director of the California Indian Culture and Sovereignty Center (CICSC). Proudfit holds a B.A. in political science with emphasis in public law from California State University, Long Beach, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in political science with emphasis in public policy and American Indian studies from Northern Arizona University. Tenured three times within the California State University system, her career history includes serving as tenured associate professor of public administration and founding director of the Tribal Government, Management and Leadership Master of Public Administration program at California State University, San Bernardino; Department Chair of American Indian Studies at San Francisco State University; and the first Special Advisor to Lieutenant Governor Cruz M. Bustamante for California Indian Sovereign Nations in 2002.

Proudfit's research specializations encompass American Indian communities, American Indian film representation and stereotypes, tribal sovereignty, federal Indian policy, tribal leadership and governance, California Indian political and contemporary issues, American Indian education, tribal telecommunications, and social justice issues. Key publications include her leadership as author and researcher on the State of American Indian & Alaska Native Education in California reports for 2012, 2014, and 2016; series editor (with Dr. Warner) of the ten-book On Indian Ground contract with Information Age Publishing, starting with On Indian Ground: A Return to Indigenous Knowledge—Generating Hope, Leadership and Sovereignty through Education (2017); “Internecine Warfare: White Privilege and American Indians in Colleges and Universities” in RIP: Jim Crow: Fighting Racism through Higher Education Policy, Curriculum, and Cultural Interventions; “Native American Gaming in California” in Native Americans (Congressional Quarterly Press); and “From Activism to Academics: The Evolution of American Indian Studies at San Francisco State 1968-2001” in the Indigenous Nations Studies Journal. Major awards and honors feature appointment by President Barack Obama to the National Advisory Council on Indian Education (2016), appointment by Governor Gavin Newsom to the Commission on the Status of Women and Girls (2021), the 2013 American Indian Educator of the Year from the California Conference on American Indian Education, the California Teachers Association Salute to Friends of Education Award, and the John F. Kennedy, Jr. Award for Outstanding Public Service. Additionally, Proudfit executive directs California’s American Indian & Indigenous Film Festival and contributes as a consultant on media projects promoting authentic Native American representation.