Scott Richard Lyons

A former director of Native American studies programs at the University of Michigan and elsewhere, Professor Lyons specializes in Native American literature and culture. His publications include X-Marks: Native Signatures of Assent (2010), The World, the Text, and the Indian: Global Dimensions of Native American Literature (2017), and a diverse array of essays. His forthcoming monograph is entitled Peacemakers: Sacred Violence in Native American Myth and Literature. He was once a newspaper columnist for Indian Country Today. An old-fashioned generalist at heart, Lyons teaches courses on the history of the short story, Catholic literature, totalitarianism, and the mimetic theory of René Girard in addition to Native American literature. His academic honors include the Beatrice Medicine Award, given for distinguished scholarship in Native American studies, and the Henry Russel Award, Michigan's highest midcareer award. The Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers gave him a Best Journalism award for his newspaper columns. Lyons is the founding director of the Kateri Institute for Catholic Studies and a founding member of the Indigenous Catholic Research Fellowship. A defender of academic freedom and free speech, Professor Lyons is an invited member of the Academic Freedom Alliance. He is a 2024-25 Faculty Fellow for the Inklings Project which is based at the University of Notre Dame's McGrath Institute. 

A proud mongrel descending from two Minnesota Indian tribes – the Mississippi Ojibwe of Leech Lake (White Oak Point) and the Mdewakanton Dakota of Lower Sioux (Loyalist) -- as well as a few immigrant tribes that sailed in, his first schooling experience was in Leech Lake Reservation's Head Start program. Many years later his first permanent academic position was at Leech Lake Tribal College. Lyons considers himself a humble family man and an avid motorcyclist, usually but not always in that order.