Makanalani Malia Gomes is a Kanaka Maoli Filipina storyteller, land and water defender, and emerging healer. Makanalani was born on Oʻahu and raised between the moku of ʻEwa, Oʻahu, and Puna, Hawaiʻi; she holds this ʻāina, as well as her ʻohana (family) and community, as her first teachers and sources of wisdom. Makanalani is connected to local and global decolonization and demilitarization movements to protect human and Indigenous rights and the health of Mother Earth, including serving as one of three co-chairs of the United Nations (UN) Global Indigenous Youth Caucus. She is part of a team of Kānaka Maoli women working on the second report of the Murdered Missing Native Hawaiian Women Girls and Māhū Task Force, making visible the experiences of violence facing these communities. She is also a community organizer and core member of Af3irm-Hawaiʻi. In her downtime, she enjoys time at the beach, planting and playing in her backyard, cooking, baking, thrifting, or going for a cruise around the island. Makanalani will graduate with her Master’s in Hawaiian Studies from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa in May 2025.