This course examines current movements of Indigenous Peoples to assert their rights to lands, resources, and cultural practices and it stresses the resilience and resistance of Indigenous communities to protect their sovereignty. We will talk about examples worldwide including protecting fishing economies (Yurok Tribe in California), opposition to coal mining (Sompeta, India), dams on sacred rivers (Lenca in Honduras), and fossil fuel pipelines (Lakota in South Dakota, Wet’suwet’en First Nation in British Columbia), reclaiming language (Wampanoag on Cape Cod), strengthening local autonomy (Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico; Aboriginals in Australia), protecting the rights of nature (laws in Ecuador, New Zealand). Current struggles for Indigenous sovereign rights will be situated in the context of protections guaranteed by the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Nancy Bonvillain is an anthropologist and linguist (PhD, Columbia University) specializing in Native American cultures and languages. She has taught at SUNY Stony Brook, Columbia University, and most recently at Bard College at Simon’s Rock. She has written about 20 ethnographies of Native American nations as well as four textbooks in anthropology. Additional interests include the resurgence of Indigenous activism worldwide for the protection of lands, resources, and cultural heritage and arts. Nancy’s fieldwork has been at the Akwesasne Mohawk First Nation in upstate New York and southern Québec/Ontario.

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