Native people are not always well represented in national arts and culture data.

There is very little national data on Native peoples’ engagement in, or work with, arts and culture. Too often, Native peoples are referred to as the “asterisk nation” because many reports use asterisks to indicate insufficient or unreliable data about Native populations. This practice stems from persistent challenges in collecting data about Native peoples.

Critically, one of these challenges is that the validity of arts participation survey measures is uncertain—meaning it’s unclear how well the relevant surveys and resulting data capture and convey Native peoples’ engagement in or work with arts and culture. Thus, there is a timely need to address how well the activities of Native peoples are captured in arts participation survey measures that drive arts policy decision-making and funding in the U.S.

In partnership with First Peoples Fund, NORC is creating better survey measures to capture a more accurate national perspective of Native peoples’ artistic and cultural activity. 

This study—a collaboration between NORC and First Peoples Fund, a national organization that supports the cultural, artistic, and ancestral practices of American Indian, Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian artists and communities—will advance knowledge about the validity of current survey measures used on key federal surveys about participation and employment in the arts for Native Americans. Through an iterative, in-depth cognitive interviewing process with Native American adults who live both on- and off-reservation, the study will provide community-informed and community-tested survey measures for arts participation and employment that better align with Native individuals’ understanding and experiences of artistic and cultural engagement.