Megan A. Baker (she/her) is a scholar, artist, and citizen of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. She is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Northwestern University.

Trained as a four-field sociocultural anthropologist and tribal historian, Megan specializes in Choctaw law and history and Southeastern US Indigenous material culture. Her research considers the intersections of Indigenous sovereignty, race, economy, and history of anthropology in North America with particular attention to the relationship between land propertization and settler colonialism. She teaches courses on the history of Native nations and US anthropology, Indigenous critical theory, Native/Indigenous feminisms, and community-engaged anthropology.

Megan’s current projects include scholarly and public-facing community-focused research. Her book manuscript (in progress) delineates how historical and anthropological knowledge production on Oklahoma Choctaws have informed and worked in tandem with US property laws to facilitate land dispossession and challenges to Indigenous sovereignty in today’s era of resurgent American Indian political-economic power. This work illustrates how Indigenous polities have shaped the development of racial capitalism within their communities and wider US as well as how treaties and tribal laws have shaped politics in Oklahoma, especially in the post-McGirt era. Her community-based projects include researching in museum collections and collaborating with fellow artists to revitalize rivercane basketry and traditional textiles.

From 2019-2023, Megan served as a Cultural Research Associate for the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma’s Historic Preservation department. As part of the Community Outreach and Research program, she was an editor and frequent author of "Iti Fabvssa," the Historic Preservation column in Choctaw Nation's Biskinik newspaper, the host of "Chahta Tosholi," a speaker series on Choctaw history and culture, and a researcher-consultant on government projects, community requests, NAGPRA repatriations, and collaborations with archives, museums and other institutions. A specialist in 19th and 20th-century Choctaw legal history, Megan authored a series titled “A New Chahta Homeland: A History by the Decade,” which covers Oklahoma Choctaw history from 1830-2000s. She has consulted on media projects with PBS Nova and exhibitions with the Choctaw Cultural Center, Gilcrease Museum, musée du quai Branly-Jacques Chirac, Bibliothèque municipal de Versailles, and others.

Megan holds a PhD in Anthropology and MA in American Indian Studies from UCLA, and BA in Ethnicity and Race Studies and Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies from Columbia University.

Contact her at megan.baker@northwestern.edu