At different times throughout the year, we feel the effects of universal changes and shifts in more ways than we realize. Those shifts occur during the winter solstice, spring equinox, summer solstice, and the autumn equinox. For thousands of years, Indigenous Peoples around the world have understood and acknowledged their interconnection with the universe, from how traditions are practiced to the effects the seasonal shifts have on us.
Cultural Survival is pleased to announce a call for applications for Indigenous Writers in Residence 2023 based on Turtle Island (United States and Canada).
On November 18-20, 2022, the Richmond, Virginia-based Pocahontas Reframed Film Festival once again raised issues of Indigenous sovereignty, climate change, decolonization, language reclamation, and the Indigenous past/present/future through films, panel discussions, readings, and live performances.
Amidst the strength and power of the Columbia and Spokane Rivers in the ancestral territories of the Spokane Tribe, there is a group of language warriors with the dream of keeping their languages alive. They run the Language House of Spokane using an immersion strategy to increase the number of fluent adult speakers.
From my apartment door, I see a blue sky hovering over the tin roof of the neighboring house. I see the blended tops of coconut trees standing so close, their palms so intertwined, that it’s hard to tell where one ends and the next begins. I see lined telephone poles and a busy road down to my right, the bus stop and grocery store across the street, and wild chickens running around below. They almost always seem to be in a hurry, but I never know where they’re going.
Long before the arrival of the settlers, the land which we call Turtle Island was bountiful of rich foods, clean water, and a vast amount of biodiversity. Cornfields wrapped around the coastline for miles, schools of fish swam so thick, and trees were so healthy they produced many nuts and fruits. Our ancestors celebrated thanksgiving about 13 times a year. In the Northeast, the first thanksgiving is the Strawberry Thanksgiving as it is the first berry of the season.
With Native American Heritage Month well underway and Thanksgiving/National Day of Mourning occurring tomorrow, it is an excellent time to celebrate Indigenous Peoples’ brilliance, honor and acknowledge truth in history, recognize whose land we are on, and work towards true allyship. We call upon our Cultural Survival community to learn from Indigenous Peoples and their true account of this federal holiday, confront settler mythologies of this country's history, understand how American colonialism and imperialism continue to impact Indigenous communities today, and to ta
I am a Na Ñuu Savi (Person of the Place of Rain, Mixtec) born in Santa Maria, California, United States, to Nivi Ñuu Savi (People of the Place of Rain) who migrated there to work as farmers in the California agricultural economy. Ñuu Savi (the Place of Rain) is in Oaxaca, Puebla, and Guerrero, Mexico, where many pueblos are known by names that describe our history.
In the Northeastern Coastal Algoquin language, our word for dugout canoe is “mishoon.” Our coastal Tribes have utilized the waterways as ancient highways for thousands of years traveling in mishoon which are considered carbon neutral water vessels. As the original population of the American northeastern region, we have faced European assimilation.
Land Acknowledgement
We acknowledge that we are headquartered on Massachusett land, in Cambridge, MA, and we thank the past, current, and future Indigenous stewards of this territory.