Understanding how multiple identities contribute towards the construction of a leader identity is key to the work of leadership. This book explores how leadership can be seen differently through exploring how indigenous artists participate in shaping, expressing and resisting cultural identities of both indigeneity and leadership.

Based on in-depth interviews with Indigenous artists from Australia, Alaska and Hawaii, this book explores how they deliver unique, dynamic forms of leadership to their communities and society. Taking a critical perspective on the intersection of leadership and identity, this book deconstructs the tensions faced by indigenous leaders and reveals the complex dilemma at the heart of leadership practice. By conceptualising the connection between individuals' identities and their practice of leadership as a set of territories that we navigate inside of ourselves in order to do the work of leadership, this book captures and makes applicable the embodied dimensions of leadership which are often neglected in research and from which broader leadership scholarship can learn new lessons.

This highly original way of critically rethinking leadership will be of interest to scholars and advanced students in leadership, as well as scholars of arts management and indigenous studies.

Dr. Michelle Evans, an Aboriginal woman originally from the Hunter Valley NSW, is a Bathurst based academic, writer, facilitator and cultural producer. Michelle works as a Senior Lecturer in Leadership at Charles Sturt University and is a Fellow at Melbourne Business School, leading the School's research agenda on Indigenous Business and Leadership　development. This role includes directing Australia's first Indigenous Business Master Class series - MURRA - established to skill up Indigenous entrepreneurs as well as program directing a series of master classes for Native Title rights bodies. She is a 2013 Fulbright Scholar. Through this opportunity she visited University of Alaska (Fairbanks), University of California (Davis) and University of Hawaii at Manoa replicating her doctoral study on Indigenous leadership in the arts. In 2012/2013 Michelle was also a Visiting Fellow of the Centre for Co-operative and Community Based Economy at the University of Victoria, Canada.　Michelle　was the founding Head of the Victorian College of the Arts Wilin Centre　for Indigenous Arts and Cultural Development from 2003-2010; founder of the Accelerate Indigenous Arts Leadership Programme; and is Trustee of the Yvonne Cohen Award for Indigenous　Creative Young People.