Dakota (given name) Dakota (given name) Dakota is a unisex given name derived from the name of an indigenous Native American tribe: Dakota people or from the name of two states in the United States: North Dakota and South Dakota which are also derived from the Dakota people local to that area. The name is translated to mean "friend", "friendly" or "allies" in the Yankton-Yanktonai and Santee dialects of the Lakota Sioux language. The name has been in occasional use for both sexes in the United States since at least the 1940s. The name's popularity grew in the 1990s in the US. It
Native American Women’s Health Education Resource Center became known as the Reproductive Rights Coalition and by 1994 included 150 women from 26 different tribes. In 1991, NAWHERC opened a women's domestic violence shelter. The "Agenda for Native Women's Reproductive Rights", which includes calls for culturally and age-appropriate sex education, affordable health care, reproductive rights and other issues for Native women, is still used in discussions today. NAWHERC runs a domestic violence shelter and has programs for AIDS prevention. They also provide programs about domestic violence, Dakota language and culture, and health and environmental awareness. NAWHERC also runs a hotline. NAWHERC collects information about Native women's health, often