Speakers will focus on Mauna Kea. Wahine have been protecting Mauna Kea for generations. Now it's been proposed to build the thirty meter telescope (TMT) on the mountain. #nwsa2019#nwsa19
They are still protecting the mountain with sit-ins, protests, blocking traffic and police, etc. The amount of labor is extensive. This fight is to protect #MaunaKea but also a fight for sovereignty and autonomy, against occupation, law breaking, hetpatriarchy. #nwsa2019#nwsa19
Asserting own forms of jurisdiction, reinvesting own governing authority. @NoeGK has provided a powerful historical context and understanding of the issues surrounding Mauna Kea. So powerful. #nwsa2019#nwsa19
They provided their own security, created blockades, chained themselves to gates, stopped traffic, placed their bodies in front of one another for protection. Dehydrated and sunburned, they formed a backbone together in unwavering love of the land. #nwsa2019#nwsa19
There was also a "feminist abolition praxis" - willingness to fight for real freedom in the face of police, oppression, etc. They blocked construction vehicles on roads. Created an encampment and staging area. #maunakea#nwsa2019#nwsa19
I'm afraid I can't do this session the justice it deserves, so my apologies for misspellings, misuse of words of which I'm mostly unfamiliar. No disrespect intended. #nwsa2019#nwsa19
Blocking of the access road of #Maunakea is at 130 days. Blocking occupation with bodies. Call for a toppling of power and rising of the people. Overcoming of shame of displacement, dance to reestablish genealogical connection to the mountain. #nwsa2019#nwsa19
This is a decolonizing project of unlearning. The tears are flowing but it's okay because "We're all of the ocean." #nwsa2019#nwsa19
This session has used poetics, chants, singing to expand and reflect #Indigenous feminisms. Origin stories are important, language is important; settler colonialism dislocates one from the language, bodies, land, and #nwsa2019#nwsa19
Settler colonialism deadens the senses and shrouds cultures in ambivalence. Aesthetics for liberation are carried within you. Opposite of anesthetic or the deadening of senses. #nwsa2019#nwsa19
"We carry our islands as we move." Language, poetry, storytelling, aesthetics help to reconnect, reestablish relationships to self, body, land, others. Examine and learn from stories. #nwsa2019#nwsa19#oceanicfeminisms#indigenousfeminisms
The use of singing for de-escalation: holding space and holding others, calming others. Surrounding and allowing others to feel emotions, keeping them safe. #NWSA2019#nwsa19
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Sherri Mitchell (Penobscot) is the final speaker at the #Indigenous History Conference. She is the author of the award-winning book Sacred Instructions; Indigenous Wisdom for Living Spirit-Based Change. sacredinstructions.life
Mitchell: What guidance have I been given that will lead me into the future? It's a circular route that we travel. We have to be living for all of our relations. This is how prayers are ended, relations are acknowledged.
Mitchell: so maybe that's where we should begin: how do we be good relatives? Think about grandmothers, mothers, aunties, they are the ones who have taught us how to be a good relative. This matrilineal line was directly attacked by colonialism and patriarchy.
Robin Wall Kimmerer is first up. If you haven't read her classic BRAIDING SWEETGRASS, you should get the beautiful special edition of it now (would make a great holiday gift!) from Milkweed Editions @Milkweed_Books: milkweed.org/book/braiding-…
Kimmerer: Will discuss the prophecies of the Seventh Fire which counter the myth of the First Thanksgiving and the overall lack of Native American historical literacy.
And the second session today at the #Indigenous History Conference is "From Traditional Knowledge to Colonial Oversight to Indigenous Integration: Educator’s Roundtable Indian Education in New England" with Alice Nash, Tobias Vanderhoop (Aquinnah Wampanoag),
Jennifer Weston (Hunkpapa Lakota, Standing Rock), and
Alyssa Mt. Pleasant (Tuscarora).
Vanderhoop: "The colonial system of education happened to us." Wampanoag in the colonized schools were seen as more controllable, agreeable, etc. But their intention to get rid of Native Americans via the colonize education system failed.
This morning I'm attending the second to last panels of the conference! "Writing Ourselves into Existence: Authors’ Roundtable: New England Native Authors and Literature" with Siobhan Senier @ssenier, Melissa Tantaquidgeon Zobel (Mohegan) @tantaquidgeon, Carol Dana (Penobscot),
John Christian Hopkins (Penobscot), Cheryl Savageau (Abenaki), and Linda Coombs (Aquinnah Wampanoag). This has been a fantastic conference, I hate that this is the last weekend! Thanks to all for your hard work! @Plymouth_400@BridgeStateU@joyce_rain18
Dawnland Voices edited by @ssenier is the first collection of its kind from Indigenous authors from what is now referred to as New England. Tribes are very good at shepherding their own literary works.