Sisters Rising

Dawn was in the Army, now she’s a tribal cop in the midst of the North Dakota oil boom. Sarah is an attorney and scholar fighting to overturn restrictions on tribal sovereignty. Patty teaches Indigenous women’s self-defense workshops. Loreline and Lisa are grassroots advocates working outside of the system to support survivors of violence and influence legislative change. Chalsey is writing the first anti-sex trafficking code to be introduced to a reservation’s tribal court.

Native American women are 2.5 times more likely to experience sexual assault than all other American women. Amnesty International found that 1 in 3 Native women reports having been raped during her lifetime and that 86% of the offenses are committed by non-Native men. Non-Indian perpetrators exploit gaps in tribal jurisdictional authority and target Native women as ‘safe victims’ with near-impunity.

In a portrait of six brave characters who refuse to let a pattern of violence against Native women continue on in the shadows, this film shines an unflinching and ultimately uplifting light onto righting injustice on both an individual and systemic level.