Larry Smith

Larry Smith (Lumbee Nation) is an accomplished producer, publicist and co-host of Pacifica's and KPFK's American Indian Airwaves, one of the longest running Indigenous public affairs radio programs in the country. He has had the honor to interview such noted figures as: James S Anaya, Noam Chomsky, Jane Fonda, Jack Forbes, Delores Huerta, Sarah James, Dr. Andrea Smith, Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, Dr. Haunani-Kay Trask, Dr. David E. Wilkins and Robert Williams, just to name a few. For his work in Indigenous media, Larry Smith and American Indian Airwaves received special recognition in 2007 by the Bolivian government's La Prefectura del Departamento de La Paz (The Prefecture of the Department of Peace).

 In 2009, Mr. Smith, President of the Indigenous Media Institute attended, through special invitation, the National Conference for Media Reform sponsored by Free Press, a national, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization working on media reform. Mr. Smith attended the national conference to discuss Indigenous human rights, media sovereignty and mass media and Internet, Communications, and Telecommunication (ICT) ownership.

 Mr. Smith has been featured in the Indigenous segment of the political documentary Fools on the Hill whereby he discusses Indigenous, media politics and aesthetics. In addition, segments from the show American Indian Airwaves were included in the sound narrative for the film California Indians. Mr. Smith’s photography has been featured in publications such as Gesellschaft für bedrohte Völker and News from Native California. Presently, Mr. Smith works in the local Indigenous community and consults on films pertaining to urban Indigenous peoples.

Mr. Smith has established four non-profit public corporations in recent years. He has a M.A. in Interdisciplinary Studies. Mr. Smith has taught at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke in Mass Media and Communications and in the American Indian Studies programs at Mesa Community College and CSULB. Presently, Mr. Smith teaches Alternative Media and Mass Media and Popular Culture in the Department of Cinematic Arts. Mr. Smith’s is presently enrolled in the PhD Ethnic Studies Program at the University of California, Riverside focusing on Indigenous Media and Policy. Mr. Smith's academic interest includes Indigenous media, policy, sovereignty; Federal Indian and communication law, mass and new media, popular culture, cultural production and politics, media representations, media democracy, Indigenous philosophies of sustainability, First and Fourth Cinema, decolonization methodologies, and propaganda and censorship in the United States mass media landscape.