WELCOME!

Dr. Meranda Roberts (Yerington Paiute Tribe and Chicana) is a curator, scholar, and educator whose work sits at the intersection of Indigenous history, museum studies, and visual culture. She holds a Ph.D. in History and an M.A. in Public History from the University of California, Riverside. Guided by Indigenous methodologies and anti-colonial pedagogy, her practice challenges colonial narratives, reconnects collections with descendant communities, and reimagines how institutions engage with Indigenous histories and futures.

Her philosophy is shaped by obligations to her elders, family, and community, and by her responsibilities as a guest on the homelands of the Acjachemen (Juaneño) and Tongva (Gabrielino) peoples. This accountability is both to the communities she represents through her own lineage and to the first peoples of these lands, who continue to be impacted by the visuals and narratives carried in museums. From this place of humility and responsibility, she approaches curating as a practice of repair and respect.

Roberts has curated and co-curated exhibitions across the country. At the Field Museum of Natural History, she co-developed Native Truths: Our Stories. Our Voices., a groundbreaking exhibition centering contemporary Native perspectives. At the Benton Museum of Art, she guest-curated Continuity: Cahuilla Basket Weavers and Their Legacies, which reunited Cahuilla baskets with descendant families and foregrounded Indigenous protocols in curatorial work. With Shinnecock artist Jeremy Dennis, she co-curated Eternal Testament: Resistance & Refusal in Contemporary Native Art at The Church in Sag Harbor, using fine art to call attention to survivance and sovereignty in the Hamptons. In 2023, she curated Still We Smile: Humor as Correction and Joy for the Native American Invitational at Idyllwild Arts, exploring Indigenous humor as a tool of healing and resistance. She has also worked with the Institute for Human Science and Culture at the University of Akron, assessing a donated collection to guide the university’s responsibilities under NAGPRA protocols.

In addition to curatorial projects, Roberts has taught in the Art History Department at Pomona College, served as a scholar-in-residence at Pitzer College, and currently sits on the Scholarly Advisory Committee for the Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum. Across these roles, she brings academic rigor, community accountability, and an ethic of integrity—always asking how the work can foster respect, responsibility, and repair.

Personal Land Acknowledgment:

I would like to acknowledge that as a Northern Paiute woman I live, work, eat, and sleep on the homelands of the Tongva (Gabrieleno) people. May we always honor this Nation, their sovereignty, their ways of life, and the love they have for their ancestors. We are all on Native Land.

If you would like to learn how to help your institution engage with anti-colonial practices, and to learn from Meranda’s experiences, please feel free to reach out to her in the link above!

As you navigate through this website, please consider engaging in reciprocity. Meranda currently works independently, and is very open with sharing so much of her journey freely.

If you learn from her and would like to give back, please consider donating to her Venmo @Meranda-R or paypal @MerandaRoberts