Enrolled in the Karuk Tribe, Jason Hockaday (he/him) completed a PhD in Native American Studies at UC Davis with designated emphases in Feminist Theory & Research and in Writing, Rhetoric, & Composition Studies. He is a member of the 2024 Funeral Service Education cohort at the American River College and of the Decolonizing and Indigenizing Death Care working group. His research trajectory began by holding an internship with his Tribe’s language department, during which he looked at gender & sexuality in Karuk language reclamation. He completed a BS in Anthropology at SOU. In grad school, his research was a feminist rhetorical analysis of prominent themes that emerged during his family’s Konomihu music reMatriation project. As many of those songs are funerary, this inspired an interest in supporting tribal jurisdiction in mortuary science by centering Karuk structures and ways of knowing, being, and doing. 

Research interests: Writing/Rhetoric/Composition, Language and Music Reclamation, Decolonizing Deathwork, Two Spirit & Indigiqueer Studies