A new website is calling for Aboriginal nations to move away from the Indian Act and towards autonomy and traditional governments.
Siku Allooloo is part Haitian, part Inuk, and now living in New York. She was part of a group of Native and non-Native people that drafted principles for the Indigenous Nationhood movement that were released this morning.
“To be able to see how far and wide the movement stretches, I find it affirming,” Allooloo says. “When you can see the amount of collective support… and that’s what I hope people get out of this site.”
Allooloo says the website will act as a central platform to house their statement of principles explaining who they are and what they stand for, and be a place for the public to get information about future actions and campaigns.
She says one of the main challenges Indigenous people face is a skewed representation in the public, in government policies and in text books. She hopes this website will help balance that by giving indigenous people more control over how they’re represented and by building solidarity with many people across different regions.
Glen Coulthard is a Weledeh Dene, and an assistant professor in the First Nations Studies Program and the Department of Political Science at the University of British Columbia. He says this movement is something Northerners can learn from and be a part of.
It’s a place where people can re-learn “traditional land-based forms of knowledge,” he says. “And start thinking about alternatives to the dominant economic model in the NWT.”
Coulthard is one of many people who plan to publish articles on the site, on topics like capitalism and Indigenous traditions.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/indigenous-nationhood-movement-goes-online-1.2415233
Indigenous Nationhood Movement
STATEMENT OF PRINCIPLES
WHO WE ARE
• We are a movement for land, life, languages, and liberation.
• We are fighting for the survival and independence of Indigenous nations.
• We are an alliance of mutual support and coordinated action that branches out in all Four Directions.
• We are an Indigenous-led movement that includes women, men, and two-spirited people of all ages, colours, and nationalities.
WHAT WE BELIEVE
• We will protect the land, water, and air that provide the basis for all life.
• Indigenous cultures, spiritualities and governments are the foundation for our continuing survival.
• It is our responsibility to take action and to live according to our original teachings and natural laws.
• Colonial laws and systems must be abolished.
• Restitution must be made for the theft of our lands and the failed attempt to exterminate our peoples.
WHAT WE STAND FOR
• Indigenous self-determination and autonomous nationhood.
• Re-empowering traditional governments.
• Defending and protecting the natural environment and all living beings.
• Reclaiming, renaming, and reoccupying Indigenous homelands and sacred spaces.
• Restoring nation-to-nation relations with Settler people and governments.
• Learning and teaching Indigenous languages, traditions, ceremonies and knowledge.
• Eliminating all forms of violence within Indigenous communities, including violence based on gender and sexual orientation.
Campaigns
Reclaim
In this campaign, we focus on actions supporting the reclamation of Indigenous cultural, historical, political and ceremonial practices that have been severed and impacted by colonial conquest including: reclaiming dispossessed lands in our territories; pursuing …
Rename
This campaign acknowledges that Indigenous place names offer a direct connection to our languages, sacred histories, and creation stories, and that the reclamation of these names is vital for the continuation of our cultures and …
Reoccupy
This campaign calls on our people to re-presence ourselves throughout our traditional territories and homelands. We support Indigenous reoccupations of contentious sites facing urbanization, resource extraction and economic development; reoccupation of traditional hunting, fishing, trapping, …
Indigenous Nationhood Movement website: