Linda S. Covey holds major and minor degrees in religious studies, psychology, anthropology, and journalism from Missouri State University. She did doctorial work in clinical psychology at Forest Institute of Professional Psychology, Springfield, Mo, and has recently finished her Masters thesis in religious studies on the Religion, Self, and Society track from Missouri State University. Linda currently teaches psychology at Missouri State University’s College of International Business embedded in Liaoning Normal University, Dalian, China. Linda’s masters thesis explores the phenomenon of why over 300 Dine’s came into the Bahá’í Faith at the Great Council Fire Unity Conference held at Pine Springs, AZ in 1962, and why more have continued to do so. She presented a short paper on her thesis, “The Navajo Tradition-Transition to the Bahá’í Faith,” at the Eighth Native American Symposium held by Southeastern Oklahoma State University in Durant. Her paper was published in the Symposium’s journal of their proceedings: Images, Imaginations, and Beyond: www.se.edu/nas/  , and she presented at the 34^th  Annual Association for Bahá’í Studies Conference-North America, “Rethinking Human Nature,” held in Vancouver, B.C. in August, 2010. Her thesis will be published as a book in the near future. During her research and interviews on the Navajo Reservation spanning a period of over ten years, Linda became acquainted with some members of the Kahn family, who figure prominently in her thesis. The eldest Kahn brother passed away within months after she interviewed him. Linda’s poem submitted here is dedicated to him.

Linda is of Cherokee/Southern Cheyenne/German heritage and has been highly active in her culture. She founded and organized the “Heart of America Spiritual Gathering” held at Temerity Woods in Rolla, Mo ( see: http://www.temeritywoods.org/) now in its 14^th year, and founded the  four-year “Nunavut Project: a journey to the arctic’s people, which was a cultural-to-cultural and spiritual-to-spiritual exchange (see www.NunavutProject.com ). In addition, Linda was a volunteer in corrections (VIC) for seven years in Missouri with the native circles in the prison system, a pow wow organizer and dancer, and helped to organize and create the non-profit Thunder Eagle Ridge Youth Camp and Retreat in Macks Creek, Mo (www.thundereagleridge.org ), serving as its first president.