Zada Ballew

Zada Ballew is an enrolled citizen of the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians and a PhD candidate in United States history at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. In her research, she explores Native American and United States history through lenses of sovereignty, nationalism, and anti-colonialism. Her current project is a business history of her tribal nation from treaties in the 1820s to per capita payments in the 2020s. The project chronicles her ancestors’ navigation of capitalism, wealth, and poverty and analyzes the strategies they used to withstand the complete theft of their homelands and ubiquitous challenges to their sovereignty. In addition to her work at UW–Madison, Ballew serves as a historical consultant for Native American and Indigenous Initiatives at her alma mater, the University of Notre Dame.