Board Bio's

Yvonne L. Swan Board Elder Member

Yvonne was born on October 28, 1943 and raised on the Colville Reservation in northeastern Washington state where she now resides. Her maternal ancestry was the Sinixt (Sn ai’ chxt) Arrow Lakes Nation whose original territory is predominantly in southeast British Columbia, Canada and part of northeast Washington state including the Colville valley. Her paternal ancestry is with the Chippewa-Cree and  Nakota (Assiniboine Sioux). Because of the USA's forced land acquisition in early Euro-colonial days, her father’s ancestors were called ‘Landless Indians’. Her paternal grandmother, Josephine Z. Swan and ten children including her father Theodore J. Swan were adopted by the Coeur d’Alene Tribe of Idaho. She has one surviving sister, Angela I. Michel and three adult children Darren Swan, Yvette Swan, and Chante Westerman. As the matriarch, Yvonne assumes the role of mother, grandmother, and great grandmother of many survivors of her siblings’ generations. 

She is an artist, poet, activist, designer, seamstress, beader, writer, program director, mentor, and speaker. She graduated from Colville High School, took college courses and quit with a Junior Class standing. She has no degree and figures Life Skills are enough to qualify her as a teacher and human rights advocate.

She is the subject of the Wanrow Instruction or the Wanrow Decision that has helped countless women defendants across the nation claiming self-defense as their defense were given a better chance in court due the case law mentioned above—the Wanrow Instruction. It changed the law regarding women and self-defenseFor more information one can research the case known as State v. Wanrow, 1977 .