About
David Edward Walker is a clinical psychologist, writer, and former singer-songwriter whose life’s work blends Native-informed community healing with a deep critique of the U.S. mental health system’s historical harms in Indian Country. A Missouri Cherokee descendent, he has dedicated his career to cultural revitalization, ethical psychology, and fostering compassion and justice through his scholarship, activism, and service
Background and Education
David Edward Walker was born in Lansing, Michigan, and spent much of his young adult life in the northern suburbs of the Detroit area, working as a dishwasher, cab driver, coffee salesman, and clerk. He overcame numerous personal challenges to complete a bachelor’s degree in psychology at Oakland University (magna cum laude), followed by a master’s degree and doctorate in clinical psychology at the University of Detroit.
Music Career (David Folks)
While establishing his psychology practice, David also pursued a performing career as a singer-songwriter under the stage name David Folks. He released two compact discs, Roadside Park and Refusing to View, which received college radio airplay across the United States. He toured nationally and shared the stage with artists including Rodney Crowell, Richard Shindell, Richie Havens, Clive Gregson, and Pierce Pettis.
After his Native-themed song “Joshua Maiden” received college radio airplay, David was invited to join the board of DreamCatchers, a Detroit-area musicians’ project benefiting Native causes. He contributed two songs to DreamCatchers compilation albums and performed at several regional concerts.
By 1997, his repertoire had expanded, leading to an invitation from Rod Kennedy to perform at the 25th Anniversary Kerrville Folk Festival, as well as an hour-long performance at Nashville’s Bluebird Café. His recordings were later recognized in Music Hound’s Essential Folk Album Guide (1998) for their emotional depth, spiritual themes, and accomplished fingerstyle guitar work.
Following a career high point at Kerrville, David chose to step away from performing, returning home and discontinuing live music for the next five years.
Clinical Practice & Work with Yakama Nation
In 2000, Dr. David Edward Walker accepted a position as the sole professional psychologist serving the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation with the Indian Health Service and relocated with his family to central Washington.
During this period, he experienced significant spiritual changes, deepened his connection to his Cherokee heritage through his father and grandmother, participated in traditional ceremonies, and became involved in the Bahá’í faith.
From the outset, David found himself in conflict with the Indian Health Service’s medical model and bureaucracy. These challenges strengthened his relationships within the Yakama Nation community. Working collaboratively with community members over several years, he helped design the first two Pathways to Hope and Healing conferences and the first Yakama-centered behavioral health program, Níix Táawaxt (“good growth to maturity”). As manager of the program, he left the Indian Health Service and continued his work under contract with Yakama Nation.
Scholarship & Critical Writing
Over time, David developed scholarship examining the role of the U.S. mental health system in Native America, focusing on its history as a source of cultural oppression. In his clinical work, he observed internalized racism among Native youth and young adults, including beliefs that academic or personal struggles were rooted in genetic inferiority—ideas traceable to early twentieth-century psychological practices in Indian boarding schools.
His critical writing began with a chapter challenging the use of the ADHD diagnosis in Indian Country for Critical New Perspectives on ADHD (Routledge, 2006), which received the National Association for Special Needs Academic Book Award (UK). In 2012, he and Dr. Albert Galves published “Debunking the ‘brain science’ behind attention deficit hyperactive disorder” in Ethical Human Psychology & Psychiatry.
In 2015 and 2016, David published four historical critiques of the U.S. mental health system in Indian Country Today, generating significant public engagement and debate.
Books & Awards
David’s first novel, Tessa’s Dance, received a medal in the 2013 Independent Publisher Book Awards, and its sequel, Signal Peak, won a 2013 IndieFAB Book of the Year Award. A 2014 review in Indian Country Today highlighted the novels’ focus on contemporary Native life, psychological healing, and cultural revitalization.
Coyote’s Swing: A Memoir & Critique of Mental Hygiene in Native America (Washington State University Press, 2023) is his first nonfiction book and the only comprehensive history and critique of the U.S. mental health system in Indian Country. The book was named a University Press Week Selection. Research and writing for the book began in 2002 and unfolded over many years.
In 2023, David received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Society for Ethical Psychology & Psychiatry.
Current Work & Life
David concluded his contract with Yakama Nation in 2022 but continues to maintain close relationships within the community. He lives with his family on the Port Madison Indian Reservation, Suquamish Nation, in western Washington.
He continues his work as a consultant, speaker, and psychologist, and remains engaged as a writer, poet, and musician.
Dave’s Talking Stick
Books
Articles & Appearances
A Case Before the U.S. Supreme Court Could Surge the Psychiatric Labelling and Drugging of Native American Foster Youth
WHO Owns the Language
A Book Review of ‘The Medicine Valley Series: Tessa’s Dance and Signal Peak’
How the US Mental Health System Makes Natives Sick and Suicidal
Lunacy, Crazy Indians & the Witch’s Hammer
‘A Living Burial’: Inside the Hiawatha Asylum for Insane Indians
Betrayal by Labels: The Feebleminded, ADHD Native Child
Debunking the Science Behind ADHD as a “Brain Disorder”
ADHD as the New ‘Feeblemindedness’ of American Indian Children
Speaking in the Borrowed Language: Mental Health as Cultural Oppression
Prediction of Recovery for Closed Head Injured Adults
#477 – Liberation Psychology and The Resilience of Indigenous Peoples with David Walker PhD
Current and Historical Oppression in the Mental Health System in Indian Country
David Walker on Indigenous Peoples and Western Mental Health
Awards & Accolades
- ISEPP Lifetime Achievement Award 2023
- University Press Week Selection
Media
Songs
David’s Gallery
Missouri Cherokee Descendent
David wishes to make clear that he is not enrolled in any federally- or state-recognized tribe or organization and makes no claim thereby. He requests that conference organizers, interviewers, and others please remember that he is no more and no less a “Missouri Cherokee descendent.”
While acknowledging his family’s European roots, David refuses to deny his Native heritage through his father, paternal grandmother, and generational grandmothers, Elizabeth Gibson, and Elizabeth Jane Albina Alexander, who were compelled to suppress who they were in the times in which they lived.
He states that he’s never profited or benefited from Cherokee connections in his family – indeed, they were buried by certain ancestors as a source of shame, and it’s been his life task to undo this damage.
If you are curious to know more, these family connections are detailed in the memoir portions of Coyote’s Swing.
Please feel free to contact him with any further questions.
