Kendall Lovely

Kendall Lovely is an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation. In spring 2026, she earned her PhD in History at the University of California Santa Barbara. She also holds a double-major B.A. in Comparative Literature and Anthropology and an M.A. in Museum Studies from the University of New Mexico, as well as an M.A. in Comparative Humanities from Brandeis University. 

Dr. Lovely brings this interdisciplinary background into a joint role as Assistant Professor of Native American Studies and Curator of Historical and Contemporary Indigenous Collections at the Maxwell Museum of Anthropology at UNM. Her current book project is an adaptation of her recently completed dissertation, From Southwest Native American Lands to Ancient Mediterranean Waters: (Re)-Storying Late Nineteenth-Early Twentieth Century Museum Anthropology for Indigenous Ancestral Futures. This research pays attention to the history of museum anthropology and collecting of Diné (Navajo) and Pueblo materials toward the development of Native arts and heritage spaces in New Mexico. Beyond this history, her project seeks to connect Indigenous material culture to forms of meaning- and memory-making outside of colonial frameworks. Environmental humanities, feminist, queer, disability studies, and Indigenous studies approaches inform this work.

Dr. Lovely accompanied her doctoral research with a digital exhibition, Red Coral Stories, which incorporates contributions and perspectives from contemporary Native American artists into her historical research. Her public-facing museum work has also included serving as curatorial assistant at the UCSB Art, Design and Architecture Museum for Tohono O’odham artist Ishi Glinsky’s first solo museum exhibition, Ishi Glinsky: Upon a Jagged (2023). Her ongoing work in museums supplements her interests in research, writing, and building and sustaining Indigenous community relations. 

She has recent publications in Forging, Public Humanities, American Indian Culture and Research Journal, and Res Difficilies.