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Current Issues in Native American Communities

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Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG)
https://www.nativewomenswilderness.org/mmiw

In both the United States and Canada, there is an epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. It is hard to know the extent of the epidemic because not enough data is being collected. Indigenous groups and their allies are working hard to raise awareness and pass legislation related to this issue. To learn more, see the links below:

 

United States Resources

 

Canadian Resources


Decolonization and Land Back Movements

The United States and Canada are countries based in settler colonialism. This means that historically and currently, governmental and economic forces have functioned to replace Indigenous peoples, cultures, and sovereignty. According to the social theorist Patrick Wolfe, this invasion is "a structure, not an event." Colonization has taken many forms in North American history: dishonoring treaties, purposely spreading disease, forced boarding schools, physical violence, and many more.

 

With all this in mind, Indigenous peoples have led and continue to lead decolonization efforts around the world. Decolonization can be formal, such as the successful independence movements of countries like India and Ghana during the mid-20th century. However, even in the absence of formal colonization, former colonial powers can and do still exercise power over their formal colonies through economic means. Many people also acknowledge that colonization has had subtle effects, such as promoting European beauty standards and influencing internalized racism. For these reasons and more decolonization is still necessary.

 

In North America in particular, some Indigenous peoples have been promoting the Land Back movement, an effort to repatriate lands to Native peoples. In many Here are some recent victories of the Land Back Movement:

 

Further Reading:

 

[Image Description: Eight Stages of White Settler-Colonial Denial      “They didn’t exist” (terra nullius)     Complete denial of Indigenous presence in a given area (country, province, etc). Includes denial of Indigeneity, e.g. “Indigenous Peoples are Settlers too”.     “If they did, they weren’t here” (terra nullius)     Denial that Indigenous People inhabit/travel/harvest/exist in a specific area. Often based on euro-centric definitions of evidence of occupation.     “If they were, they didn’t use the land” (doctrine of discovery)     Denial that Indigenous People have a connection to the Land. Often based on euro-centric worldviews of the land as something to be owned and extracted.     “If they did, they didn’t deserve it (great chain of being)     Denial that Indigenous People have rights to their Lands. Often based on euro-centric value judgments of “primitive vs. civilized”, “nomadic vs. sedentary”.     “If they did, they lost it” (right of conquest)     Denial that Indigenous People retain the rights to their Lands. Often based on false claims of supremacy of colonial legal institutions and systems     “If they didn’t it doesn’t matter any more” (Westphalian sovereignty)     Denial that Indigenous Rights are still binding and take precedence. Often based one false claims of supremacy of colonial legal institutions and systems.     “If it does, we need to move on” (liberalism)     Denial that violations of Indigenous Rights requires redress. Often based on claims redress is “disruptive/unfair/reverse racism” & false calls for equality”.     “If we can’t, we are you” (self-indigenization)     Denial of separateness of Indigenous Peoples and Rights. Often bases on attempts to reduce Indigenous Rights to Human Rights, claim Indigeneity, etc  (CC SA 4.0 “Eight Stages of Settler Denial”. Revision 1) /end ID ]


Endangered Languages

“When a language dies, so much more than words are lost. Language is the dwelling place of ideas that do not exist anywhere else. It is a prism through which to see the world." - Robin Wall Kimmerer of the Potawatomi nation, Braiding Sweetgrass 

 

Roughly every two weeks, a language dies with its last speaker, according to National Geographic. The Endangered Languages Project estimates that 40 percent of the 7,000 languages that exist today are in danger of going extinct over the next several decades. Causes of language extinction can be both subtle and overt. Some examples include colonization, separation of children from their families, genocide, stigma associated with native languages, and more. According to experts, three significant methods for recovering endangered and extinct languages are to teach these languages to young children, foster environments in which these languages are accepted and promoted, and making recordings of current speakers.

 

Further Reading:


Environmentalism

"Someone needs to explain to me why wanting clean drinking water makes you an activist, and why proposing to destroy water with chemical warfare doesn't make a corporation a terrorist." - Winona LaDuke of the Ojibwe nation

 

Indigenous peoples in North America have often been at the forefront of environmental activism. This is not only because numerous Native groups' religions and cultural beliefs promote profound respect for the Earth and other beings who share the planet with humans, but also because industrial projects such as uranium mining and pipeline construction (such as the Keystone XL Pipeline and Dakota Access Pipeline) disproportionately affect Native communities. At the same time, many Native folks also reject the idea of the "noble savage," the idea that all Natives have always been in perfect harmony with nature.

 

 


Food Sovereignty

According to La Via Campesina, "Food Sovereignty is the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems." From their website, "La Via Campesina is an international movement bringing together millions of peasants, small and medium size farmers, landless people, rural women and youth, indigenous people, migrants and agricultural workers from around the world. Built on a strong sense of unity, solidarity between these groups, it defends peasant agriculture for food sovereignty as a way to promote social justice and dignity and strongly opposes corporate driven agriculture that destroys social relations and nature."

 

There are Seven Pillars of food sovereignty, the first six of which were developed at the International Forum for Food Sovereignty in Nyéléni, Mali, in 2007, and the last added during the People’s Food Policy process by members of the Indigenous Circle.

 

The Seven Pillars of Food Sovereignty

1. Focuses on Food for People

  • Puts people’s need for food at the center of policies
  • Insists that food is more than just a commodity

 

2. Builds Knowledge and Skills

  • Builds on traditional knowledge
  • Uses research to support and pass this knowledge to future generations
  • Rejects technologies that undermine or contaminate local food systems

 

3. Works with Nature

  • Optimizes the contributions of ecosystems
  • Improves resilience

 

4. Values Food Providers

  • Supports sustainable livelihoods
  • Respects the work of all food providers

 

5. Localizes Food Systems

  • Reduces distance between food providers and consumers
  • Rejects dumping and inappropriate food aid
  • Resists dependency on remote and unaccountable corporations

 

6. Puts Control Locally

  • Places control in the hands of local food providers
  • Recognizes the need to inhabit and to share territories
  • Rejects the privatization of natural resources

 

7. Food is Sacred

  • Recognizes that food is a gift of life, and not to be squandered
  • Asserts that food cannot  be commodified

 

Further Reading:

 


Health Disparities

 

As a result of disproportionate rates of poverty, environmental racism, food deserts, and other factors, many Indigenous individuals and communities struggle with higher rates of diseases and conditions such as alcoholism, diabetes, asthma, cancer, and more. Because of these existing infrastructural problems, Indigenous nations have been more vulnerable to the COVID-19 pandemic than other groups.

 

Further Reading:


Media Representation

Image description: A screenshot from Tumblr user saintzitao. The black text on a white background reads "name one native american intellectual off the top of your head, name one native american actor or actress off the top of your head, name one native american senator, one native american news anchor, or an author or a tv personality or a singer or a poet or a comedian, name a single native american teacher you’ve had, can you? probably not. ok so now think of one native american cartoon character you know of or a sports team relating to native americans whether it’s their actual name or their team logo, or a town you live in or near with a “native” name bet a lot of these things came to you right away i bet you didn’t even have to think. needing native representation in media, education and government are not decoy issues, the commercialization and appropriation of native cultures are not decoy issues, the lack of native representation is institutional oppression at work" End of Image Description

 

A large proportion of the literature, television, film, video games, art, and other media that features Indigenous characters was created by people who are not Indigenous themselves. As a result, these forms of media often promote harmful and derogatory stereotypes or imply that Native people cannot speak for themselves. There are also many examples, particularly in early television and film, of red face, where white or otherwise non-Native actors would use makeup to alter their skin tone to mimic Native people. A famous example is the 1971 "Crying Indian" anti-littering commercial from the organization Keep America Beautiful.

 

Thankfully, in recent years Native authors, artists, directors, actors, and more have been making more opportunities to represent themselves authentically and challenge pervasive myths about their cultures.

 

Further Reading:


Police Violence and Incarceration

 

Native Americans face disproportionate rates of police violence and incarceration. The violence that Native Americans face at the hands of police and the prison system are rooted in centuries of government-mandated efforts to control them, confine them, and remove them from their land. The Centers for Disease Control have revealed that "Native Americans are killed in police encounters at a higher rate than any other racial or ethnic group." 

 

Further Reading:

 

 

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