Keewaydahn: Going Home

Indigenous people can live without American society, but American society cannot live without indigenous cultural knowledge. In her lecture to the Schumacher Center for a New Economics, Winona LaDuke compares indigenous cultures to industrial cultures, recounts the holocaust of indigenous peoples, explains indigenous sustainability, and describes the impact indigenous and industrial cultures have had on the land. On the White Earth Reservation where LaDuke lives and works, they practice indigenous sustainability, which requires careful management, observation and an intimate knowledge of the land. Despite the hardship of having their land taken from them, they are working steadily to regain ownership and strengthen and restore their traditional economy, thereby strengthening their traditional culture. She proposes that regardless of heritage, people share their stories and build sustainable communities that reintegrate cultural traditions informed by the land and based on a common set of values.

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