Land Back

Last updated

Land back graffiti with anarchist symbology and an unrelated artist, 2020 Free Cap Hill.jpg
Land back graffiti with anarchist symbology and an unrelated artist, 2020

Land Back, also referred to with hashtag #LandBack, is a decentralised campaign that emerged in the late 2010s among Indigenous Australians, Indigenous peoples in Canada, Native Americans in the United States, other indigenous peoples and allies who seek to reestablish Indigenous sovereignty, with political and economic control of their ancestral lands. [1] [2] [3] Activists have also used the Land Back framework in Mexico, [4] and scholars have applied it in New Zealand and Fiji. [5] Land Back is part of a broader Indigenous movement for decolonisation. [6] [1]

Contents

Description

Land Back aims to reestablish Indigenous political authority over territories that Indigenous tribes claim by treaty. [7] Scholars from the Indigenous-run Yellowhead Institute at Toronto Metropolitan University describe it as a process of reclaiming Indigenous jurisdiction. [3] The NDN Collective describes it as synonymous with decolonisation and dismantling white supremacy. [1] Land Back advocates for Indigenous rights, preserves languages and traditions, and works toward food sovereignty, decent housing, and a clean environment. [3]

Land Back was introduced in 2018 by Arnell Tailfeathers, a member of the Blood Tribe, a nation within the Blackfoot Confederacy. It then quickly became a hashtag (#LandBack), and now appears in artwork, on clothes and in beadwork. These creations are often used to raise funds to support water protectors and land defenders who protest against oil pipelines in North America. [8]

The Black Hills land claim and protests at Mount Rushmore during Donald Trump's 2020 presidential campaign was a catalyzing moment for the movement in the United States. [9] [1]

Philosophy

The NDN Collective describes the Land Back campaign as a metanarrative that ties together many different Indigenous organizations similar to the Black Lives Matter campaign. [1] They say that the campaign enables decentralised Indigenous leadership and addresses structural racism faced by Indigenous people that is rooted in theft of their land. [1]

Land Back promotes a return to communal land ownership of traditional and unceded Indigenous lands and rejects colonial concepts of real estate and private land ownership. [7] Return of land is not only economic, but also implies the return of relationships and self-governance. [5]

Land Back does not mean that non-Indigenous people should be made to leave unceded Indigenous lands. [10] [7]

Methods

In some cases, land is directly returned to Indigenous people when private landowners, municipalities, or governments give the land back to Indigenous tribes. This may take the form of a simple transaction within the colonial real estate framework. [2]

Indigenous-led projects may also use community land trusts to reserve lands for their group. [10]

Actions

In 2020, electronic music group A Tribe Called Red produced a song "Land Back" on their album The Halluci Nation , to support the Wetʼsuwetʼen resistance camp and other Indigenous-led movements. [8] In July 2020, activists from NDN Collective held a protest on a highway leading to Mount Rushmore, where Donald Trump was to give a campaign speech. The site, known to the Sioux in English as "The Six Grandfathers," [11] is on sacred, unceded land, subject to the Black Hills land claim. These protestors drafted the "Land Back Manifesto", which seeks "the reclamation of everything stolen from the original Peoples". [12] Also in 2020, Haudenosaunee people from the Six Nations of the Grand River blockaded 1492 Land Back Lane to shut down a housing development on their unceded territory.[ citation needed ]

In 2021, Nicholas Galanin (Tlingit/Unangax) created a gigantic "Indian Land" sign – in letters reminiscent of southern California's Hollywood sign – at the entry for the Desert X festival. [13] On July 4, 2021, in Rapid City, South Dakota, a city very close to the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, four people were arrested after climbing a structure downtown and hanging an upside-down US flag emblazoned with the words "Land Back". [14]

Transfers

The Wiyot people have lived for thousands of years on Duluwat Island, in Humboldt Bay on California's northern coast. [2] In 2004 the Eureka City Council transferred land back to the Wiyot tribe, to add to land the Wiyot had purchased. [15] The council transferred another 60 acres (24 ha) in 2006. [16]

The Mashpee Wampanoag have lived in Massachusetts and eastern Rhode Island for thousands of years. In 2007, about 300 acres (1.2 km2) of Massachusetts land was put into trust as a reservation for the tribe. Since then, a legal battle has left the tribe's status—and claim to the land—in limbo. [2]

In 2016 Dr. Mohan Singh Virick, a Punjabi Sikh doctor who served Indigenous people in Cape Breton for 50 years, donated 350 acres (140 ha) of land to Eskasoni First Nation. [17] He also donated a building in Sydney to help house Eskasoni's growing population. [18]

In October 2018, the city of Vancouver, British Columbia returned ancient burial site (the Great Marpole Midden) land back to the Musqueam people. The land is home to ancient remains of a Musqueam house site. [19] [20]

In 2019, the United Methodist Church gave 3 acres (1.2 ha) of historic land back to the Wyandotte Nation of Oklahoma. [2] The US government in 1819 had promised the tribe 148,000 acres (600 km2) of land in what is now Kansas City, Kansas. When 664 Wyandotte people arrived, the land had been given to someone else. [21]

In July 2020, an organization of self-identified Esselen descendants purchased a 1,200-acre ranch (4.9 km2) near Big Sur, California, as part of a larger $4.5m deal. This acquisition, in historical Esselen lands, aims to protect old-growth forest and wildlife, and the Little Sur River. [22]

Land on the Saanich Peninsula in British Columbia was returned to the Tsartlip First Nation in December 2020. [23]

Management of the 18,800-acre (76 km2) National Bison Range was transferred from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service back to the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes in 2021. [24]

In August 2022, the Red Cliff Chippewa in northern Wisconsin had 1,500 acres (6.1 km2) of land along the Lake Superior shoreline returned to them from the Bayfield County government. This came after the tribe signed a 2017 memorandum of understanding with the county, acknowledging the Red Cliff Chippewa's desire to see their reservation boundaries restored in full. [25]

In 2024, the Government of British Columbia transferred the title of more than 200 islands off Canada's west coast to the Haida people, recognizing the nation's aboriginal land title throughout Haida Gwaii. [26] [27]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Odawa</span> Indigenous people of North America

The Odawa are an Indigenous American people who primarily inhabit land in the Eastern Woodlands region, now in jurisdictions of the northeastern United States and southeastern Canada. Their territory long preceded the creation of the current border between the two countries in the 18th and 19th centuries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wyandotte Nation</span> Federally recognized Native American tribe in Oklahoma

The Wyandotte Nation is a federally recognized Native American tribe headquartered in northeastern Oklahoma. They are descendants of the Wendat Confederacy and Native Americans with territory near Georgian Bay and Lake Huron. Under pressure from Haudenosaunee and other tribes, then from European settlers and the United States government, the tribe gradually moved south and west to Michigan, Ohio, Kansas, and finally Oklahoma in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wiikwemkoong First Nation</span> Unceded territory in Ontario, Canada

The Wiikwemkong First Nation is a First Nation on Manitoulin Island in Northern Ontario. The Wiikwemkong Unceded Territory is the First Nation reserve in the northeast of Manitoulin Island in Manitoulin District, Ontario, Canada. Wiikwemkong is an unceded Indigenous reserve in Canada, which means that it has not "relinquished title to its land to the government by treaty or otherwise."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wiyot</span> Indigenous people of California

The Wiyot are an indigenous people of California living near Humboldt Bay, California and a small surrounding area. They are culturally similar to the Yurok people. They called themselves simply Ku'wil, meaning "the People". Today, there are approximately 450 Wiyot people. They are enrolled in several federally recognized tribes, such as the Wiyot Tribe, Bear River Band of the Rohnerville Rancheria, Blue Lake Rancheria, and the Cher-Ae Heights Indian Community of the Trinidad Rancheria.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Musqueam First Nation</span> First Nation in British Columbia, Canada

The Musqueam Nation is a First Nation whose traditional territory encompasses the western half of what is now Greater Vancouver, in British Columbia, Canada. It is governed by a band council and is known officially as the Musqueam Indian Band under the Indian Act. "Musqueam" is an anglicization of the Hunquminum name xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, which means "place of the river grass" or "place where the river grass grows".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yurok</span> Indigenous people in California, United States

The Yurok are an Indigenous peoples of California from along the Klamath River and Pacific coast, whose homelands stretch from Trinidad in the south to Crescent City in the north.

Deborah A. Miranda is an American writer, poet, and professor of English at Washington and Lee University. Her father, Alfred Edward Robles Miranda, is of self-identified Esselen and Chumash descent. Her mother, Madgel Eleanor (Yeoman) Miranda, was of French and Jewish ancestry. Miranda claims descent from what are known as "Mission Indians," Indigenous peoples of many Southern California tribes who were forcibly removed from their land into several Franciscan missions. She is a member of the Ohlone-Costanoan Esselen Nation, an unrecognized organization that identifies as a tribe.

The Robinson Treaties are two treaties signed between the Ojibwa chiefs and the Crown in 1850 in the Province of Canada. The first treaty involved Ojibwa chiefs along the north shore of Lake Superior, and is known as the Robinson Superior Treaty. The second treaty, signed two days later, included Ojibwa chiefs from along the eastern and northern shores of Lake Huron, and is known as the Robinson Huron Treaty. The Wiikwemkoong First Nation did not sign either treaty, and their land is considered "unceded".

The Saugeen Ojibway Nation Territory, also known as Saugeen Ojibway Nation, SON and the Chippewas of Saugeen Ojibway Territory, is the name applied to Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation and Saugeen First Nation as a collective, represented by a joint council. The collective First Nations are Ojibway (Anishinaabe) peoples located on the eastern shores of Lake Huron on the Bruce Peninsula in Ontario, Canada. Though predominantly Ojibway, due to large influx of refugees from the south and west after the War of 1812, the descendants of the Chippewas of Saugeen Ojibway Territory also have ancestry traced to Odawa and Potawatomi peoples.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tuluwat Island</span> Archaeological site in California, United States

Tuluwat Island is located on Humboldt Bay within the city of Eureka, California. The 1860 Wiyot Massacre was perpetrated in the village of Tolowot or Tuluwat on this island. A National Historic Landmark encompasses the midden at Gunther Island Site 67. Since October 21, 2019, the Wiyot people have had the land deed to most of the Island.

The following is an alphabetical list of topics related to Indigenous peoples in Canada, comprising the First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Seizure of the Black Hills</span> Land dispute between Native Americans and the US government

The United States government illegally seized the Black Hills – a mountain range in the US states of South Dakota and Wyoming – from the Sioux Nation in 1876. The land was pledged to the Sioux Nation in the Treaty of Fort Laramie, but a few years later the United States illegally seized the land and nullified the treaty with the Indian Appropriations Bill of 1876, without the tribe's consent. That bill "denied the Sioux all further appropriation and treaty-guaranteed annuities" until they gave up the Black Hills. A Supreme Court case was ruled in favor of the Sioux in 1980. As of 2011, the court's award was worth over $1 billion, but the Sioux have outstanding issues with the ruling and have not collected the funds.

The Native Writers' Circle of the Americas (NWCA) is an organization of writers who identify as being Native American, First Nations, or of Native American ancestry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Indigenous peoples of California</span> Native Californians

Indigenous peoples of California, commonly known as Indigenous Californians or Native Californians, are a diverse group of nations and peoples that are indigenous to the geographic area within the current boundaries of California before and after European colonization. There are currently 109 federally recognized tribes in the state and over forty self-identified tribes or tribal bands that have applied for federal recognition. California has the second-largest Native American population in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Halluci Nation</span> Canadian electronic music group

The Halluci Nation, formerly known as A Tribe Called Red, is a Canadian electronic music group who blend instrumental hip hop, reggae, moombahton and dubstep-influenced dance music with elements of First Nations music, particularly vocal chanting and drumming. Based in Ottawa, Ontario, the group consists of Tim "2oolman" Hill, and Ehren "Bear Witness" Thomas. Former members include co-founder DJ Jon Deck and Dan "DJ Shub" General, who left the band for personal reasons in spring 2014, and was replaced by Hill. Co-founder Ian "DJ NDN" Campeau left the band for health reasons in October 2017, with the band opting to remain a duo for the time being.

The Wiyot Tribe, California is a federally recognized tribe of Wiyot people. They are the aboriginal people of Humboldt Bay, Mad River and lower Eel River of California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ma'amtagila First Nation</span>

The Ma’amtagila First Nation (also styled Maamtagila), formerly known as Mahteelthpe or Matilpi, are an Indigenous nation and part of the Kwakwaka'wakw peoples. Their territory is located in the Queen Charlotte Strait-Johnstone Strait area in the Discovery Islands between Vancouver Island and the British Columbia mainland in Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount Rushmore Fireworks Celebration</span>

A Fireworks Celebration at Mount Rushmore held on July 3, 2020, was the first and only use of fireworks at Mount Rushmore since 2008. President Donald Trump spoke at the event, which was also attended by South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, host of Entertainment Tonight Mary Hart, First Lady Melania Trump and Trump's eldest son Donald Trump Jr.

NDN Collective is an indigenous-led activist and advocacy organization based in Rapid City, South Dakota, United States. Founded in 2018, NDN Collective works with more than 200 Indigenous-led groups in the U.S. NDN Collective's mission is "Build the collective power of Indigenous Peoples, communities, and Nations to exercise our inherent right to self-determination, while fostering a world that is built on a foundation of justice and equity for all people and the planet." and includes "defend: our people, communities, and nations; develop: Indigenous communities in a regenerative and sustainable manner, and decolonize: our minds, communities, and sovereign nations." According to president and CEO Nick Tilsen, NDN Collective has "an overall strategy to shift power, decolonize wealth, and resource Indigenous people who are on the front lines of fighting for justice and equity." NDN is operated entirely by Indigenous leadership, board, and staff that come from over 25 Tribal Nations.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Pieratos, Nikki A; Manning, Sarah S; Tilsen, Nick (2021). "Land Back: A meta narrative to help indigenous people show up as movement leaders". Leadership. 17 (1): 47–61. doi:10.1177/1742715020976204. ISSN   1742-7150.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 Kaur, Harmeet. "Indigenous people across the US want their land back -- and the movement is gaining momentum". CNN . Retrieved February 10, 2021.
  3. 1 2 3 "Opinion: 'Land Back' is more than a slogan for a resurgent Indigenous movement" . Retrieved February 10, 2021.
  4. ↑ Barnett, Tracy L. (May 12, 2022). "Wixarika Caravan to AMLO: We Want Our #LandBack". The Esperanza Project. Retrieved March 2, 2023.
  5. 1 2 "Land, land banks and land back: Accounting, social reproduction and Indigenous resurgence". EPA: Economy and Space. doi:10.1177/0308518X211060842. hdl: 10092/103260 .
  6. ↑ "The "Landback" Movement Would Return Stolen Land to Indigenous Stewardship". In These Times. Retrieved March 2, 2023.
  7. 1 2 3 Toastie, B. (August 22, 2022). "Questions about the LandBack movement, answered". High Country News. Retrieved August 24, 2022.
  8. 1 2 Moscufo, Michela. "For These Indigenous Artists 'Land Back' Is Both A Political Message And A Fundraising Opportunity". Forbes. Retrieved May 12, 2023.
  9. ↑ Nelson, Kate (February 20, 2024). "The Land Back Movement Isn't Just Focused on Ancestral Grounds — It's Fighting to Preserve and Restore Foodways Too". Eater . Retrieved February 28, 2024.
  10. 1 2 Yesno, Riley (2022). "Land Back". New Internationalist (540): 26–29.
  11. ↑ "Native History: Construction of Mount Rushmore Begins". IndianCountryToday.com. Retrieved February 10, 2021.
  12. ↑ "Landback Manifesto". Landback. NDN Collective . Retrieved February 10, 2021.
  13. ↑ "Vast 'Indian Land' sign draws visitors to Desert X art festival". France 24 . March 12, 2021. Retrieved March 25, 2021.
  14. ↑ "4 arrested after hanging "LANDBACK" flag from Omaha Street grain elevator". Kota TV. 2021.
  15. ↑ "North Coast Journal - July 1, 2004: COVER STORY - The Return of Indian Island - Restoring the center of the Wiyot world". www.northcoastjournal.com. Retrieved February 10, 2021.
  16. ↑ McHugh, Paul (September 20, 2005). "THE NORTH COAST: A Kayak Adventure / GOING HOME AGAIN / On a sacred island in Humboldt Bay, descendants of the Wiyots -- an Indian tribe nearly wiped out by massacres in the 1800s -- forge a future from the remnants of that tragic past". SFGATE. Retrieved February 10, 2021.
  17. ↑ "Cape Breton doctor to be honoured". Cape Breton Post. SaltWire Network. October 2, 2017.
  18. ↑ Ayers, Tom (May 2014). "Respected physician says First Nation needs the land 'more than I do'". Mi’kmaq-Maliseet Nations News. Retrieved March 17, 2021.
  19. ↑ "Vancouver returns city-owned land to Musqueam". CBC . Retrieved April 1, 2022.
  20. ↑ "Portion of c̓əsnaʔəm village and burial site returned to Musqueam". Musqueam Official Website. Retrieved April 1, 2022.
  21. ↑ "United Methodist Church gives historic mission site and land back to Wyandotte Nation". IndianCountry Today. Retrieved February 10, 2021.
  22. ↑ "Northern California Esselen tribe regains ancestral land after 250 years". The Guardian . July 28, 2020. Retrieved February 11, 2021.
  23. ↑ "sartlip First Nation territory doubles in size after traditional land returned by B.C. government". CBC . July 28, 2020. Retrieved April 1, 2022.
  24. ↑ "Montana's National Bison Range transferred to tribes". AP News . January 17, 2021. Retrieved May 4, 2021.
  25. ↑ Kunze, Jenna. "Chippewa Tribe Gets 1,500 Acres of Lake Superior Land Back in NW Wisconsin". Native News Online. Retrieved September 10, 2022.
  26. ↑ Cecco, Leyland (April 15, 2024). "Canada hands 'long-overdue' title over more than 200 islands to Haida Nation". The Guardian. ISSN   0261-3077 . Retrieved July 5, 2024.
  27. ↑ Onishi, Norimitsu; Bracken, Amber (July 4, 2024). "On Small Islands Off Canada's Coast, a Big Shift in Power". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved July 5, 2024.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.