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Elaine Miles | |
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 Miles in 2001 | |
| Born | April 7, 1960 Pendleton, Oregon, U.S. |
| Nationality | Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, [1] American |
| Occupation | Actress |
Elaine Miles is a Native American actress best known for her role as Marilyn Whirlwind in the television series Northern Exposure . She's an enrolled citizen of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation. [1]
Elaine Miles was born in Pendleton, Oregon, on April 7, 1960. She is a citizen of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation with Cayuse/Nez Perce ancestry. [1] She lived on the Umatilla Indian Reservation in Eastern Oregon until age three. [2] [3] Her family then moved to Renton, Washington, where her father was a Boeing machinist.
She learned skills and Indigenous art techniques skills in her youth, such as storytelling, beading, pottery and weaving, and she is a prize-winning powwow dancer. [2] [4]
Miles was offered the role of Marilyn Whirlwind when she was spotted in the waiting room at an audition. This came as a surprise as she had not come with any intent to audition—she was only there to give her mother, Armenia Miles, a ride. [2] She had no previous acting experience. [4] She gained respect in the American Indian community, not only for portraying a Tlingit woman, but for her efforts to make sure the character was a culturally accurate representation. Miles was named Native American Woman of the Year in 1993, and America's Celebrity Indian of the Year in 1995. [4]
In 1995, Miles was nominated for a Screen Actors Guild Award as part of the Northern Exposure cast in the category, Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series. [5]
Since Northern Exposure, Miles has done tours with her dancing and stand-up comedy, has emceed at numerous powwows, and had roles in independent films such as Smoke Signals , Skins and The Business of Fancydancing . [4] With fellow comedian Drew LaCapa (Apache), she has made an exercise video ("RezRobics") addressing diabetes rates among Native Americans. [4] The video mixes powwow dancing, martial arts, and aerobics moves with nutritional advice. In contrast to the usual FBI warning, the creators encourage people to copy the video freely and distribute it among friends and relatives in Indian Country. [6]
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1990-1995 | Northern Exposure | Marilyn Whirlwind | TV series, 110 episodes |
| 1994 | Bill Nye, the Science Guy | self | documentary, TV series, 2 episodes |
| 1995 | Mad Love | Housekeeper | feature film |
| 1996 | The Rez | Mad Etta | TV series, 18 episodes |
| 1996 | Pandora's Clock | Housekeeper | TV mini-series, 2 of 2 episodes |
| 1998 | Scattering Dad | TV movie | |
| 1998 | Smoke Signals | Lucy | feature film |
| 2002 | The Business of Fancydancing | Kim | feature film |
| 2002 | Skins | Rondella Roubaix | feature film |
| 2003 | Images of Indians: How Hollywood Stereotyped the Native American | self, archive footage | documentary, TV movie |
| 2007 | Tortilla Heaven | Caridad | feature film |
| 2008 | Fry Bread Babes | self | documentary, short film |
| 2009 | Wyvern | Deputy Barnes | TV movie |
| 2012 | Universal VIP | N'ah | short film |
| 2012 | By the Salish Sea | Salish Woman | voice, short film |
| 2014 | Four Quarters | Mrs. Burke | feature film |
| 2015 | Fishing Naked | Louise 'Grandma' Ottertale | feature film |
| 2019 | Juanita | Mountain | feature film |
| 2023 | The Last of Us | Florence | Episode: "Kin" |
The Nez Perce are an Indigenous people of the Plateau who still live on a fraction of the lands on the southeastern Columbia River Plateau in the Pacific Northwest. This region has been occupied for at least 11,500 years.
Pendleton is a city in and the county seat of Umatilla County, Oregon, United States. The population was 17,107 at the time of the 2020 census, which includes approximately 1,600 people who are incarcerated at Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution.
Walla Walla, Walawalałáma, sometimes Walúulapam, are a Sahaptin Indigenous people of the Northwest Plateau. The duplication in their name expresses the diminutive form. The name Walla Walla is translated several ways but most often as "many waters".
The Cayuse are a Native American tribe in what is now the state of Oregon in the United States. The Cayuse tribe shares a reservation and government in northeastern Oregon with the Umatilla and the Walla Walla tribes as part of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation. The reservation is located near Pendleton, Oregon, at the base of the Blue Mountains.
Umatilla may refer to:
The Palouse are a Sahaptin tribe recognized in the Treaty of 1855 with the United States along with the Yakama. It was negotiated at the 1855 Walla Walla Council. A variant spelling is Palus. Today they are enrolled in the federally recognized Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation and some are also represented by the Colville Confederated Tribes, the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation and Nez Perce Tribe.
The Umatilla are a Sahaptin-speaking Native American tribe who traditionally inhabited the Columbia Plateau region of the northwestern United States, along the Umatilla and Columbia rivers.
The Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation are the federally recognized confederations of three Sahaptin-speaking Native American tribes who traditionally inhabited the Columbia River Plateau region: the Cayuse, Umatilla, and Walla Walla.
The Tamástslikt Cultural Institute is a museum and research institute located on the Umatilla Indian Reservation near Pendleton in eastern Oregon. It is the only Native American museum along the Oregon Trail. The institute is dedicated to the culture of the Cayuse, Umatilla, and Walla Walla tribes of Native Americans. The main permanent exhibition of the museum provides a history of the culture of three tribes, and of the reservation itself. The museum also has a second hall for temporary exhibitions of specific types of Native American art, craftwork, history, and folklore related to the tribes.
The Umatilla Indian Reservation is an Indian reservation in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. It was created by The Treaty of 9 June 1855 between the United States and members of the Walla, Cayuse, and Umatilla tribes. It lies in northeastern Oregon, east of Pendleton. The reservation is mostly in Umatilla County, with a very small part extending south into Union County. It is managed by the three Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation.
The Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon (CTGR) is a federally recognized tribe of Indigenous peoples of the Northwest Plateau. They consist of at least 27 Native American tribes with long historical ties to present-day western Oregon between the western boundary of the Oregon Coast and the eastern boundary of the Cascade Range, and the northern boundary of southwestern Washington and the southern boundary of northern California.
Wasco-Wishram are two closely related Chinook Indian tribes from the Columbia River in Oregon. Today the tribes are part of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs living in the Warm Springs Indian Reservation in Oregon and Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation living in the Yakama Indian Reservation in Washington.
Umatilla is a variety of Southern Sahaptin, part of the Sahaptian subfamily of the Plateau Penutian group. It was spoken during late aboriginal times along the Columbia River and is therefore also called Columbia River Sahaptin. It is currently spoken as a first language by a few dozen elders and some adults in the Umatilla Reservation in Oregon. Some sources say that Umatilla is derived from imatilám-hlama: hlama means 'those living at' or 'people of' and there is an ongoing debate about the meaning of imatilám, but it is said to be an island in the Columbia River. B. Rigsby and N. Rude mention the village of ímatalam that was situated at the mouth of the Umatilla River and where the language was spoken.
The Burns Paiute Tribe of the Burns Paiute Indian Colony of Oregon is a federally recognized tribe of Northern Paiute Native Americans in Harney County, Oregon, United States.
The Salish peoples are indigenous peoples of the American and Canadian Pacific Northwest, identified by their use of the Salishan languages which diversified out of Proto-Salish between 3,000 and 6,000 years ago.
The Native American peoples of Oregon are the set of Indigenous peoples who have inhabited or who still inhabit the area delineated in today's state of Oregon in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. While the state of Oregon currently maintains relations with nine federally recognized tribal groups, the state was previously home to a much larger number of autonomous tribal groups, which today either no longer exist or have been absorbed into these larger confederated entities. Six of the nine tribes gained federal recognition in the late 20th century, after undergoing the termination and restoration of their treaty rights starting in the 1950s.
Charles F. Sams III is an American conservationist who is the 19th and current director of the National Park Service since 2021. A member of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, Sams is the first Native American to serve as head of the NPS.
Roberta "Bobbie" Conner, also known as Sísaawipam, is a tribal historian, activist, and indigenous leader who traces her ancestry to the Umatilla, Cayuse, and Nez Perce tribes. Conner is known for her work as the Director of the Tamástslikt Cultural Institute in Pendleton, Oregon, which seeks to protect, preserve, and promote the culture of the Umatilla, Cayuse, and Walla Walla peoples. In her role at the Tamástslikt Cultural Institute Conner has worked to educate the public on and preserve Indigenous culture through the "We Are," "We Were," and "We Will Be" series of exhibits, and has mentored young scholars interested in tribal cultural preservation. Conner has also sought to educate the public and fight for Native American rights in her personal life as an activist, with a special emphasis on the impact of the division into Tribal Nations and segregation into boarding schools on indigenous cultures, tribal land rights, sustainability, and the repatriation of human remains and funerary objects to Native American lands.
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