What is Kali Reis’ ethnicity? The boxer’s Native American roots

Kali Reis’s role as Evangeline Navarro in True Detective: Night Country is her biggest yet. She has the potential to turn the former world boxing champion into a major Hollywood star. A natural in front of the camera, Reis had a memorable acting debut in Catch the Fair One: she earned an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Female Lead for her performance.

Kali Reis is of Native American and Cape Verdean descent.

Kali Reis was born on August 24, 1986 to a Cape Verdean father and a Native American mother in Providence, Rhode Island. She comes from the Seaconke Wampanoag, Nipmuc and Cherokee indigenous peoples. After her parents divorced, Reis grew up immersed in Native American culture.

“My mother raised me as a single parent and we attended native powwows regularly in addition to competing,” Reis said. WBAN. A powwow is a gathering of Native American communities where they sing, dance, and honor the traditions of their ancestors. Reis revealed that she struggled with her biracial identity when she was a child. She said that she “was never native enough or black enough.”

“The natives have this idea of ​​hair being straight, so I would ask my mom to straighten it before the Powwow competitions, just to make sure no one would make fun of me and call me the ‘black girl,'” Reis said. social boxing. “I became comfortable being uncomfortable at a young age. I had to turn towards myself; “I had no one to talk to or confide in when I was going through my own struggles.”

Through trial and error and boxing, Reis became comfortable with her unique identity. She incorporated her native name, Mequinonoag, meaning “Many Talented”, into her boxing name, KO Mequinonoag. She also used her platform to advocate for the Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women (MMIW) movement. She said social boxing:

“It has been an epidemic that has affected native women since the colonizers set foot on our island. They considered native women to be vulnerable, uneducated or promiscuous. It is easy for these perpetrators – because it is – to come to native lands and commit these crimes without being charged for it. “This is due to the lack of resources, the lack of protection, the lack of many things.”

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Categories: Biography
Source: vcmp.edu.vn

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