Indigenous Arts - Weaving Together our Communities: Past, Present, and Future

JUNE 2023

VOLUME 47, ISSUE 2

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

PRESIDENT

Kaimana Barcarse (Kanaka Hawai’i)

VICE PRESIDENT

John King

TREASURER

Steven Heim

CLER K

Nicole Friederichs

Valine Brown (Haida)

Kate R. Finn (Osage)

Laura Graham

Richard A. Grounds (Yuchi/Seminole)

Stephen Marks

Mrinalini Rai (Rai)

Tui Shortland (Māori)

Jannie Staffansson (Saami)

Stella Tamang (Tamang)

FOUNDERS

David & Pia Maybury-Lewis

Cultural Survival Headquarters 2067 Massachusetts Ave.

Cambridge, MA 02140

t 617.441.5400 f 617.441.5417 www.cs.org

Cultural Survival Quarterly

Managing Editor: Agnes Portalewska

Contributing Arts Editor: Phoebe Farris (Powhatan-Pamunkey)

Copy Editor: Jenn Goodman

Designer: NonprofitDesign.com

Copyright 2023 by Cultural Survival, Inc.

Cultural Survival Quarterly (ISSN 0740-3291) is published quarterly by Cultural Survival, Inc. at PO Box 381569, Cambridge, MA 02238. Periodical postage paid at Boston, MA 02205 and additional mailing offices. Postmaster: Send address changes to Cultural Survival, PO Box 381569, Cambridge, MA 02238. Printed on recycled paper in the U.S.A.

Please note that the views in this magazine are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of Cultural Survival.

Writers’ Guidelines

View writers’ guidelines at our website (www.cs.org) or send a self-addressed, stamped envelope to: Cultural Survival, Writer’s Guidelines, PO Box 381569, Cambridge, MA 02238.

10 From Dust We Are Made Hartman Deetz (Mashpee Wampanoag)

Members of the Wampanoag Nation reclaim historical narratives through theater.

12 The Magical Dreams of Paula Nicho Diana Pastor (Maya K’iche’)

Paula Nicho Cúmez (Maya Kaqchikel) draws inspiration from her dreams for her paintings.

14 Overcoming Shame, Becoming Visible, and Claiming Sámi Identity Through Spoken Word Camilla Lindschouw

Ida Helene Benonisen (Sámi) is a Queer spoken word poet based in Oslo, Norway.

16 Colonialism, Capitalism, and Climate Concerns

Bobbie Chew Bigby (Cherokee)

Across much of Indian Country, Bruce Caesar (Pawnee/Sac and Fox) is well known for his exquisite metalwork and jewelry.

18 Decolonizing Indigenous Art in South Africa

Shaldon Ferris (Khoisan)

Interview with Lukretia Booysen (Griekwa, Nama), founder and curator of the Koena Art Institute.

20 Building Chamorro Community Through the Arts

Jayna Shoda Meyer (Chamorro)

Guåhan-based Breaking Wave Theatre Company is building a strong community that transcends location.

22 Sharing Good Intentions for Inner Peace Through Kené

Interview with Sara Flores, a prominent Shipibo painter from Peru.

24 A Tradition Under Threat

Dev Kumar Sunuwar (Koĩts-Sunuwar) and Anoj Tharu (Tharu)

Message

2 In the News

4 2SLGBTQ+ Voices Being Sámi and A Transgender Man: Levi Sørum

6 Rights in Action

The European Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive: Why Does It Matter for Indigenous Peoples?

8 Indigenous Languages OTYKEN: Putting Siberian Indigenous Languages and Music on the Map

26 Keepers of the Earth Fund Grant Partner Spotlight Shatar 38 Project

28 Staff Spotlight Cliver Ccahuanihancco Arque (Quechua)

29 Bazaar Artists Roots of South Sudan

Donors

Tattoo arts among Indigenous women in Nepal are not being passed down to younger generations.

like you make our work around the world possible. Thanks so much for being part of Cultural Survival!

Indigenous Arts—Weaving Together

Our Communities Past, Present, and Future

Dear Cultural Survival Community,

Art carries power: the power to make people feel, to transcend boundaries, and to contribute to narrative shifts. Art can also reflect the creator’s times, surroundings, and cultural values, while connecting us to the past, present, and future. Artists hold important roles in our societies by keeping, making, and transforming meaning. They help to shape our communities and societies through their imaginations and selfdetermined expressions.

This issue of the CSQ is dedicated to Indigenous artists who are using art as a medium to combat the ongoing challenges of racist and colonialist erasure, cultural appropriation, and exploitation. Through their work, Indigenous artists are striving to break down barriers and debunk racist stereotypes while showcasing Indigenous brilliance. For centuries, colonization, globalization, and capitalism have interrupted Indigenous Peoples’ cultural continuity as well as the intergenerational transmission of knowledge and cultural practice of the arts. Through storytelling and performing arts, Indigenous artists are reclaiming narratives and creating a resurgence of Indigenous knowledge.

In line with our mission and vision, Cultural Survival has long engaged in support of Indigenous artistic expression through folk art, music, dance, craftsmanship, and theater. When we gathered to reassess our organizational strategy in 2020, we renewed our commitment to Indigenous artistic expression through culture, identifying it as one of the major themes of our work in our Strategic Framework.

We share stories of Indigenous artists who are breaking down stale colonial narratives around what art is—who holds the power to define it, who gives it value, and what role it can play in our society. For too long, Indigenous art has been relegated in the mainstream eye to tourist souvenirs,

downgraded as folk art, craft, utilitarian, or worse, seen as authentic only in its historical form.

We are inspired by the artists that form the Shipibo Conibo Center in Harlem, NY, who are merging Indigenous traditions with contemporary art and rejecting the false siloing of art from purpose. Instead, these Shipibo artists—including women like Sara Flores, featured on our cover, who lead in the matrilineal tradition of women as artists—are adamant that the “work of art and the work of environmental activism . . . towards Indigenous sovereignty cannot be separated; they must move forward on the same path.”

With this issue we are also excited to announce the long anticipated return of our Cultural Survival Bazaars, a beloved tradition in the New England area since 1975, for the first time since the pandemic. We invite you to join us at the Prudential Center in Boston December 14–17, 2023.

The Bazaars are a series of cultural festivals providing Indigenous artists, cooperatives, and their representatives from around the world the opportunity to sell their work directly to the public in the Northeast U.S. while allowing the general public to learn about and provide direct financial support to Indigenous art and artists.

In addition to the opportunity to purchase art directly from Indigenous makers, our Bazaars offer cultural performances and presentations including live music, storytelling, artmaking demonstrations, and the chance to talk directly with artists and community advocates. We invite you to celebrate the resilience of the Indigenous artists through the pandemic by supporting their work.

Everything we do is made possible with your support. Thank you for investing in Indigenous-led solutions and leadership.

With gratitude,

Galina Angarova (Buryat) Executive Director

CULTURAL SURVIVAL STAFF

Galina Angarova (Buryat), Executive Director

Mark Camp, Deputy Executive Director

Avexnim Cojtí (Maya K’iche’), Director of Programs

Verónica Aguilar (Mixtec), Program Assistant, Keepers of the Earth Fund

Bryan Bixcul (Maya Tz’utujil), Executive Coordinator

Cliver Ccahuanihancco Arque (Quechua), Keepers of the Earth Program Assistant

Miguel Cuc Bixcul (Maya Kaqchikel), Accounting Associate

Jess Cherofsky, Advocacy Program Manager

Michelle de León, Executive Assistant

Roberto De La Cruz Martínez (Binnizá), Information Technology Associate

Danielle DeLuca, Senior Development Manager

Shaldon Ferris (Khoisan), Indigenous Radio Program Coordinator

Sofia Flynn, Accounting & Office Manager

Nati Garcia (Maya Mam), Capacity Building Manager

Adriana Hernández (Maya K'iche'), Emerging Strategies Coordinator

Natalia Jones, Advocacy Associate

Mariana Kiimi (Na Ñuu Sàvi/Mixtec), Advocacy Assistant

Dev Kumar Sunuwar (Koĩts-Sunuwar), Community Media Program Coordinator

Rosy Sul González (Kaqchikel), Indigenous Rights Radio Program Manager

Bia’ni Madsa’ Juárez López, (Mixe/Ayuuk ja’ay & Zapotec/Binnizá), Keepers of the Earth Fund Program Manager

Marco Lara, Social and Digital Media Coordinator

Kevin Alexander Larrea, Information Technology Associate

Carlos Madrigal (Mazahua/Jñatjo), Capacity Building Program Assistant

Jamie Malcolm-Brown, Communications & Information Technology Manager

Amparo Monzón (Maya K’iche’), Program Assistant, Community Media & Indigenous Rights Radio Programs

Cesar Gomez Moscut (Pocomam), Community Media Program Coordinator

Edson Krenak Naknanuk (Krenak), Lead on Brazil

Diana Pastor (Maya K’iche’), Media Coordinator

Guadalupe Pastrana (Nahua), Indigenous Rights Radio Producer

Agnes Portalewska, Senior Communications Manager

Sócrates Vásquez (Ayuujk), Program Manager, Community Media

Miranda Vitello, Development Coordinator

Candy Williams, Human Resources Manager

Raquel Xiloj (Maya K’iche’), Community Media Grants Coordinator

Pablo Xol (Maya Qʼeqchiʼ), Design and Marketing Associate

INTERNS

Katrina Arriola, Camilla Lindschouw, Yolis López Martínez, Charlie Malcolm-McKay, Alyson Odar, Alma Xochitl Zamora

Australia | Eastern Marr Peoples Secure Land Rights

(MARCH)

The Federal Court of Australia has returned the Eastern Marr Peoples’ native title over Crown lands and national parks after a 10-year-long legal battle for recognition. The decision covers over 8,500 square kilometers along the Great Ocean Road in the state of Victoria.

U.S. | Tribes Consult on Dam Removal Project

(MARCH)

The Karuk and the Yurok Tribes, in collaboration with the states of California and Oregon, decided the terms of the Klamath River Restoration, which is the largest dam removal project to date. All dams included in the project are expected to be removed before 2025.

Holy See | Vatican Repudiates the Doctrine of Discovery

(MARCH)

At the behest of Indigenous Peoples, the Vatican has formally rejected the Doctrine of Discovery that warranted Native land dispossession in the colonial era, and which to this day still informs some property laws, including in the United States and Canada.

Canada | Indigenous Names Accepted on Birth Certificates

(MARCH)

Indigenous parents won a year-long legal battle challenging the Vital Statistic

policy of only accepting names composed of Latin alphabetic characters on official birth certificates. The court decision allows all Indigenous individuals to claim Indigenous names, regardless of their current age.

U.S. | Wabanaki Nations Push for Federal Recognition

(MARCH)

Wabanaki Nations made a case for Tribal self-determination to the Maine state legislature for the first time in state history. The new legislation aims to revise the Settlement Act, which excludes Wabanaki Nations from federally recognized rights and protections.

Australia | Referendum on Indigenous Advisory Body Introduced

(MARCH)

A referendum to the Australian Constitution has been introduced to Parliament that would formally recognize the voices of First Peoples of Australia by establishing an advisory body called Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice.

Peru | Voluntarily Isolated Peoples under Threat

(MARCH)

A proposed alteration to the Protection of Indigenous Peoples in Isolation and Initial Contact Situations (PIACI) would give regional governments the power to uphold or scrap already demarcated reserves for isolated Peoples and suspend proceedings declaring new Indigenous reserves.

U.S. | Swinomish Tribe Wins Trespassing Lawsuit

(MARCH)

Burlington Northern Santa Fe has been ordered to pay damages to the Swinomish Tribe after knowingly violating a treaty by increasing train traffic on the reservation without the consent of the Tribe. In March, a BNSF train carrying crude oil derailed, spilling approximately 3,100 gallons of oil on Swinomish territory.

Pacific | Indigenous Peoples Deny Consent for Deep Sea Mining

(MARCH)

Fifty-six Indigenous groups are challenging governments and the International Seabed Authority to put an immediate ban on deep sea mining. At the 28th session of the ISA meeting, March 20, Indigenous leaders directly addressed ISA delegates, making it clear that they have never given consent to deep sea mining and urging the ISA to pause all new mining license applications.

Mexico | New University of Indigenous Languages Created

(FEBRUARY)

On International Mother Language Day, February 21, the Mexican National Institute of Indigenous Peoples announced the creation of the University of Indigenous Languages of México (ULIM), a national university specializing in Indigenous languages.

Norway | Sámi Youth Occupy Government Ministries

(MARCH)

After more than 500 days since the Norwegian Supreme Court’s ruling that the Fosen windmill farms violate Sámi reindeer herders’ right to cultural practice, Sámi youth occupied government ministries demanding the government respect and comply with the ruling. This is the biggest rebellion since the 1980s.

Ecuador | Rights of Nature Upheld in Historic Court Decision

(APRIL)

An Ecuadorian court sided with the Intag Valley communities in a monumental ruling regarding the Llurimagua Copper Mining Project. The court revoked all mining licenses for the project, preserving the natural integrity of the area and reinforcing the communities’ right to consultation, setting a legal precedent for the fight against extractivism.

Operation Endgame by Sámi youth is the largest Sámi demonstration to date against the Norwegian Petroleum and Energy Department for their operation of wind farms, which are detrimental to reindeer grazing. Photo by Rasmus Berg.

ADVOCACY UPDATES

Japan: Joint Report Highlights Violations Against Indigenous Peoples (JANUARY)

Cultural Survival’s Advocacy Program launches international campaigns in support of grassroots Indigenous movements as they put pressure on governments and corporations to respect, protect, and fulfill the rights of their communities.

Global: Indigenous Rights Are Lowest Scoring Category in Automakers’ Supply Chains (MARCH)

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Cultural Survival collaborated on a stakeholder report for Japan’s Universal Periodic Review, held on January 31, 2023. The report concludes that Japan commits several human rights violations in respect to Indigenous Peoples. Whereas Japan has recognized the Ainu as Indigenous Peoples, the Ryukyuan/Okinawan Peoples are yet to be recognized, despite their self-determination claims as per the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and unique ethnicity, history, culture, and traditions. Lack of recognition perpetuates the endangerment of Ryukyu languages and history. The report also focuses on violations on rights to traditional lands and territories of the Ryukyu/Okinawa Peoples, predominantly land controlled by the U.S. for military purposes. The UN Declaration stipulates the importance of prohibiting military activities on Indigenous territories; however, Japan violates this by promoting militarization on the land. Despite the cultural significance of salmon fishing for the Ainu Peoples, Japanese law permits criminal prosecution for fishing on traditional fishing grounds.

Argentina: Action Plan on Human Rights Defenders in Environmental Matters

Presented at COP2 Escazú  (APRIL)

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The second Conference of the Parties to the Escazú Agreement took place in Buenos Aires, Argentina on April 19–21, 2023. The Regional Agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation, and Justice in Environmental Matters in Latin America and the Caribbean, better known as the Escazú Agreement, is the first regional environmental treaty that is binding. Cultural Survival was present to monitor how Indigenous Peoples’ rights are being incorporated. As a result of this process, the draft annotated index of the Action Plan on Human Rights Defenders on Environmental Matters was presented. This draft will be open for public consultation until July 6, 2023. Some demands from Indigenous Peoples during this COP2 were that the Working Group on Human Rights Defenders on Environmental Matters include Indigenous representation; consultations on the Action Plan should not only be done online; if necessary extend the consultation on the draft to allow for in-person consultations with Indigenous Peoples; ensure that the public consultation on the draft Action Plan on Human Rights Defenders is translated into Indigenous languages; include Indigenous Peoples' selfprotection mechanisms in the Action Plan.

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A coalition of climate, environmental, and human rights organizations, including Cultural Survival, launched the “Lead the Charge” campaign in March. The campaign urges automakers to transform their electric vehicle supply chains to be equitable, sustainable, and fossil fuel-free, and to respect Indigenous Peoples’ rights while recognizing the impact that their supply chains have on the climate and the environment. Indigenous rights were in the lowest-scoring category in the Industry Leaderboard analysis. As of yet, no manufacturer has implemented concrete mechanisms and procedures on how to realize commitments to Indigenous Peoples’ rights in practice throughout supply chains. The analysis makes it clear that without direct reference to Free, Prior and Informed Consent as per the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in automakers’ Supplier Code of Conduct, automakers are unable to conduct appropriate risk assessments regarding Indigenous rights.

Global: SIRGE Coalition Urges Action to Secure Indigenous Rights in Green Economy (APRIL)

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At the 22nd Session of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, First Peoples Worldwide, Cultural Survival, Batani Foundation, Earthworks, and Society for Threatened Peoples, together as the Securing Indigenous Peoples’ Rights in the Green Economy Coalition (SIRGE) submitted a joint intervention. “Limiting States’ carbon emissions brings growing dependence on battery technology, increasing the demand for transition minerals such as nickel, lithium, zinc, and copper. If electric vehicles replaced all currently existing vehicles, mineral requirements for this technology would quadruple by 2040. Fifty-four percent of the 5,097 transition mineral projects worldwide are located on or near Indigenous territories. The high demand for these minerals has resulted in violations of Indigenous Peoples’ collective rights,” the intervention states. The Coalition urges stopping violations of Indigenous Peoples’ rights by providing the resources necessary to develop and implement Indigenous Peoples’ own Free, Prior and Informed Consent protocols; conducting a study on the human health effects of transition mineral extraction occurring on`Indigenous Peoples’ traditional lands and territories; strengthening mechanisms for reporting and addressing violations of Indigenous rights; and securing Indigenous Peoples’ rights to their lands, waters, and resources.

BEING SÁMI AND A TRANSGENDER MAN LEVI SØRUM

Camilla Lindschouw (CS INTERN)

Growing up in Tana (Deanu), Sápmi land, Levi Sørum (Sámi) lived most of his life rooted in Sámi culture and language. He says he feels fortunate to have attended Sámi kindergarten and one year of Sámi elementary school, in light of Norway’s history of attempting to erase Sámi culture. Besides being Sámi, Sørum is a Transgender man—although he considers the term Transgender more of a physical description than an identity. “I personally can’t say that I identify as one thing or the other. I feel like I’m just me. If you were to ask me about my gender, I am a man. I use he/him pronouns,” Sørum says.

Growing up Sámi, Sørum says that his assigned gender role was not an overt challenge: “I’m a relatively masculine person. I think because of that, I never really had any difficulties with Sámi culture. I was born into the female gender role, but in Sámi culture, even the female gender role is quite masculine compared to Western standards.” Although there may be a tendency for women to tend more to the home and for men to engage in outdoor tasks, the roles overlap. Sørum says the Sámi culture is “very forgiving for women and female people engaging in typically ‘masculine’ activities. In fact, it may even be considered positive,” he explains.

After transitioning in his 20s, Sørum says the biggest challenge has been the fear of not living up to the Sámi male gender role. “While I’m generally masculine by Western standards, I don’t really feel like I’m masculine enough by Sámi standards. That bar is suddenly much higher,” he says. Practicing duodji (Sámi traditional crafts) is an example of a situation where he feels a stigma around his masculinity. Sámi culture distinguishes ‘soft’ duodji (knitting, weaving, leather working) from ‘hard’ duodji (woodwork, working with bones and horns); whereas soft duodji is considered a women’s practice, hard duodji is considered a man’s practice. Sørum engages in both forms, as practicing duodji is an important

Levi Sørum.

Photo by Katja Hansen.

way for him to express his cultural identity. However, he explains that he is not very open about practicing soft duodji for fear of not being perceived as masculine enough. “I had to claim it [the masculine gender role]. So maybe I feel a bit scared of losing it,” he says.

For Sørum, the biggest issue in Sámi culture as a Transgender man is the lack of representation and visibility. “I didn’t know any Queer people growing up because everyone kept quiet about it. To this day, I don’t know any Sámi Transgender men that are older than me,” Sørum explains. “I didn’t really learn about Transgender people until quite late in life. It [was] something that was far away and didn’t really exist in my world. I didn’t really know that people like me could be Transgender until early adulthood, actually.”

The lack of visibility of Sámi Transgender people made it difficult for Sørum to figure out his feelings around his identity. He says he always knew, in a way, that he was Transgender, as his body felt “wrong.” However, he didn’t know what the disconnect between his mind and body actually meant. Sørum remembers how he was told as a child that his negative feelings towards his body would go away if he simply lost weight. Reflecting on the incident that later helped him realize that he is Transgender, Sørum recalls the moment when a former classmate from the Sámi elementary school came out as Transgender in a Facebook post. “I didn’t realize it then, but that was important to me in the sense that Ttransgender people weren’t just this mythical creature existing far away, they were in my home, too, so to speak,” he says. Still, the classmate identified as non-binary and appeared more feminine, and Sørum didn’t fully relate to them.

Later, more critical pieces fell into place around his early 20s, when Sørum learned about the existence of Transgender men. “I learned it through some TV show or something, I don’t remember exactly what, but there were these characters that actually were kind of tomboyish and basically looked like girls in boys’ clothing and used ‘he’ pronouns. But I couldn’t exactly relate to them either,” he recalls.

The lack of relatability remained an obstacle for Sørum in coming to terms with feeling the strain of having a female body. He describes how, during this time, he turned to Google to understand his feelings. “I remember one of the first searches, the hits were: ‘these are the signs that you might be Transgender.’ And I was like, what is this? I didn’t really internalize that. I just kind of brushed it off.” Being unable to relate completely to others made it difficult for him to picture himself as both Sámi and a Transgender man.

Another challenging aspect of growing up Sámi and Queer is the relationship between language and identity. Recently, Queer-identifying Sámi started a project of trans-

lating the Rainbow Dictionary into the three biggest Sámi languages. Having to use a different language, including Norwegian, Finnish, Swedish, and Russian, to express a Queer identity contributes to the alienation of being both Queer and Sámi. Although Sørum is not involved in this project, he explains it was born of a consequence of Stateled policies targeted at erasing Sámi languages. Many Sámi people, including Queer-identifying Sámi people, feel as if important aspects of their identity are taken away from them, language being one of them. “I think if we had a Queer vocabulary in Sámi when I grew up, I wouldn’t think of being Queer as this Western thing. It would be more a part of my own culture. Using a different language to describe something makes it more foreign,” he says.

Recalling his own experience of coming out to his dad, Sørum says the Norwegian language, rather than Sámi, was the only tool available to him to express the discrepancy between his feelings and his body. He could only verbalize this transition to his dad via text message, as this is the only context in which they communicate in Norwegian with each other. “That’s the only way I knew how to come out to my dad. I kind of wish I could have done it in person, but I don’t really know how I would have phrased it because we don’t have the vocabulary. I think it’s important to get that, to translate those words. I think it’s important, not just for me, but for a lot of other people who don’t have the words to describe their own identity in their own language,” he explains.

Being an intersection of two small demographics, Sámi and Transgender, community building is an important aspect of fostering relatability. Trondheim Pride in 2019 was the first time Sørum realized the existence of a Queer Sámi community. “Suddenly, while celebrating, I saw all these Sámi people and I was like ‘where have you been all my life?’ I realized I had to meet more Queer Sámi people. It’s something that I feel the need to do to feel a sense of belonging,” he recalls. Soon after, Sørum joined the Queer Sámi volunteer organization, Garmeres, which not only gave him community but showed him how other Queer people “are finding ways to express themselves within the Sámi [culture].” Still, Sørum says, “in the Sámi community in general, I often feel like I’m too Queer [and] in the Queer community, I often feel like I’m too Sámi.”

While no community is a perfect fit, the Queer Sámi community is crucial to Sørum, as it provides a safe space for him to be himself, one where he does not feel judged or discriminated against. “When I go out in the world, I wear the mask that is going to make me blend in the most because I don’t want to have to deal with anything. I don’t really take that off until I get more comfortable with people. Sometimes when I have taken off that mask, I’ve come to regret it later. There is definitely always this safety calculation going on,” Sørum says.

THE EUROPEAN CORPORATE SUSTAINABILITY DUE DILIGENCE DIRECTIVE

Why Does It Matter for Indigenous Peoples?

The CSDDD is of great significance to Indigenous Peoples around the world for two reasons. First, we are in the moment of the so-called green energy transition, which seeks mineral resources that are essential for smartphones, electric cars, and solar energy. This implies a new and more aggressive frontier of mineral extraction for metals such as lithium, copper, nickel, and cobalt; a World Bank Group report finds that the production of these minerals could increase by nearly 500 percent by 2050.

Edson Krenak (KRENAK, CS STAFF) Galina Angarova (BURYAT, CS STAFF)

As the European Union undertakes a more robust legislative approach requiring a more human rights-focused and environmentally conscious framework in its legislative initiatives, such an approach has the potential to transform the EU legal system. Human rights and environmental due diligence processes could shift from voluntary audits, certification, and the area of so-called soft law to one of legal accountability for non-compliance with international and national laws. Much of what is happening in the European Union, which is one of the largest consumer markets in the world, will dictate how raw materials will be sourced, processed, and traded globally.

From February 27–March 2, 2023, a delegation of Indigenous leaders met with European Union Parliamentarians in Brussels, Belgium, to bring attention to the impacts of extractive industries on Indigenous Peoples’ rights, lands, and environments globally. The meetings were co-organized by Transport & Environment, CATAPA, European Environmental Bureau, and Cultural Survival to discuss the EU’s proposed Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD). As historically marginalized Peoples, it was important for us to engage and deliver urgent messages to parliamentarians and commissioners about how supply and value chains leading to the EU market directly impact Indigenous communities.

The second reason is that the vast majority of these resources are on Indigenous lands, which presents an existential threat to the lives and well being of Indigenous Peoples. Indigenous territories contain significant concentrations of untapped heavy metal reserves around the world. Data shows that in the United States, 97 percent of nickel, 89 percent of copper, 79 percent of lithium, and 68 percent of cobalt reserves and resources are located within 35 miles of Native American reservations. Globally, a recent study published in Nature Sustainability in 2022 found that 54 percent of mining projects extracting minerals needed for the green energy transition overlapped with Indigenous lands. The proposed CSDDD presents both opportunities and challenges for Indigenous Peoples.

Opportunities

The Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive could substantially transform the legal global framework of human rights and international environmental laws if it includes the various frameworks pertinent to Indigenous Peoples’ rights, including the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, International Labor Organization Convention No.169, and the UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders. It is deeply consequential for Indigenous Peoples because it aims to ensure that European companies neither cause nor contribute to human rights abuses and environmental damage in their operations, supply and value chains, and business relationships. If approved, it will require companies to identify, prevent, mitigate, and account for the adverse impacts of their activities on human rights and the environment, including those of Indigenous Peoples. The CSDDD aims to be a legal framework to protect Indigenous Peoples’ rights and interests by holding companies accountable for their actions overseas.

A delegation of Indigenous leaders and allied organizations met with EU Parliamentarians to discuss the impacts of extractivism on Indigenous Peoples’ rights and lands.

Photo by Marco Lara.

The CSDDD will provide Indigenous Peoples and civil society greater access to information and participation in decision-making processes related to corporate activities that affect their lives, territories, and environments at local and global levels. The impact that the extractive industry has on Indigenous Peoples specifically cannot be overstated. The Business and Human Rights Resources Centre reported in 2021 that 495 human rights allegations had been made against all 115 companies involved in transition mineral extraction over a period of 10 years. This legislation carries the potential to transform the industry’s power to promote more responsible and sustainable business practices that respect the rights and interests of Indigenous Peoples and contribute to their well being and self-determination.

Challenges

There are eight primary reasons why the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive might fail—and compromise the just transition to a green energy economy in the process.

1. As drafted, the CSDDD fails to adequately recognize and address the right to Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC). The absence of any reference to FPIC could lead to Indigenous Peoples being excluded from decisionmaking processes about activities that affect their lives and territories. Without explicitly referencing Indigenous Peoples’ rights frameworks such as ILO Convention No. 169, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and the UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders, the CSDDD may not contain strong enough enforcement mechanisms to ensure that companies are held accountable for their actions.

2. The CSDDD only provides for civil liability, which may not be enough to stop companies from engaging in harmful activities or to compensate Indigenous Peoples for loss and damage.

3. There is a substantial inconsistency between the proposed CSDDD and the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, a European directive that requires companies to report on the impact of their activities on the environment and society.

4. As drafted, the legislation will only apply to about one percent of European companies (companies with 500+ employees and an annual profit of EUR 150 million or more). Its limited scope excludes smaller-scale projects and leaves several stages of the supply chain unaddressed.

5. Such limited scope will not adequately address the issue of land and resource rights—one of the most important issues for Indigenous Peoples and critical for the survival of vulnerable communities. Most violations of Indigenous Peoples’ rights are perpetrated by small and mediumsized businesses at the beginning of the supply chains where land grabbing, violence, forced displacement, and environmental harm occur.

6. The CSDDD fails to address the systemic injustices, both current and historical, that Indigenous Peoples have faced because of European colonialism and extractivism.

7. Litigation is an intricate, expensive, and prohibitive process for Indigenous communities. The CSDDD fails to provide any guidance on the mechanisms for corporate liability or the redress for this crucial aspect of justice.

8. Article 15 of the CSDDD conspicuously excludes references to greenhouse gas emissions and their environmental impacts. It fails to recognize the connection between environmental degradation and climate change as viewed through the lens of both Indigenous knowledge and scientific inquiry. The proposal requires companies to adopt a plan to ensure that their business model and strategy are compatible with a sustainable economy and the limiting of global warming to 1.5°C. The proposed provision is ambiguous and incoherent and gives companies total freedom to define the scope of loss and damage finance mechanisms. For these reasons, the European Company Law Experts Group argues that Article 15 should be taken out of the CSDDD.

Needed Actions

The version of the CSDDD drafted in March contained language ensuring the respect of Indigenous Peoples’ right to lands, territories, and resources that they have traditionally owned, occupied, or otherwise used or acquired (Annex, Part I, Point 20). However, as the draft moved to the European Council, Point 20 was deleted, along with a reference to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples from Subheading 2 of the Annex.

The European Council followed a similar process in regard to deforestation-free products and battery regulation by deleting direct references to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, creating a major gap in the protection of the rights of Indigenous Peoples. The European Commission, Parliament, and Council say that they are committed to closing this gap. However, as we have witnessed, references to main frameworks that ensure the rights of Indigenous Peoples are disappearing without notice right before the adoption of these important pieces of legislation. Legal uncertainties, loopholes, and ambiguities threaten implementation.

All three branches of the EU legislative system have the unique opportunity to ensure that the rights of Indigenous Peoples are respected, protected, and fulfilled. After the approval of the provision during upcoming negotiations among the European Commission, Parliament, and Council, EU Member States must establish rules for effective due diligence to avoid adverse impacts on human rights, the environment, and Indigenous Peoples’ rights. The inclusion of references to Indigenous Peoples, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, ILO Convention 169, and most importantly, the right to Free, Prior and Informed Consent in the text and annexes of the CSDDD is essential.

OTYKEN

PUTTING SIBERIAN INDIGENOUS LANGUAGES AND MUSIC ON THE MAP

With its stunning natural beauty and formidable landscapes, Siberia has captivated and inspired people worldwide. The vast expanses of untamed wilderness and rugged terrain is home to a rich cultural tapestry of Indigenous Peoples. This is exemplified in the unique music of OTYKEN, a collective of Siberian Indigenous musicians who have taken the world by storm with their distinct blend of traditional and modern sounds.

OTYKEN began in 2017 after Andrey Medonos, Director of the Ethnographic Museum in Krasnoyarsk, was approached by tourists looking for traditional Siberian music performances. Medonos saw an opportunity to showcase the talents of Indigenous musicians and singers from the Taiga region and assembled a group of predominantly women artists. “This is our homeland and we try to put the pieces of Indigenous Peoples’ cultures into our music and share it with the rest of the world. Via our music people get to know about us, our culture and traditions,” OTYKEN says.

OTYKEN’s music transports listeners to an ancient and contemporary world, blending haunting melodies and rhythmic beats that speak to the heart and soul of Siberian Indigenous cultures. Each song features a variety of local musical instruments, including the vargan (jaw harp), khomys (a Khakas two-stringed instrument), Morin khuur (a two-stringed instrument played with a horsehair bow), and leather drums, among others. The musicians also incorpo-

rate throat singing, a style that produces multiple notes simultaneously creating a hypnotic and otherworldly sound. The collective’s unique music is deeply rooted in the traditions of the Khakassian, Chulyms, and other Indigenous cultures, and their songs are a testament to the perseverance of these communities. “Our songs and our whole essence is all about nature. We cannot live without this pure connection as we’ve grown up in Siberian villages near taiga and rivers. Our surroundings are something that we care [for] and respect,” OTYKEN says.

Many Indigenous communities living in Siberia face isolation and marginalization. The use of critically endangered languages in OTYKEN’s music is a significant contribution to keeping Indigenous cultures thriving. “We sing our songs in Khakass, Chulym, and other Indigenous languages. In our opinion, this is what can revive the situation with our endangered languages,” OTYKEN says. The name OTYKEN derives from the Turkic word for “a sacred site where warriors laid down their arms and held talks.” Through their music, OTYKEN are committed to ensuring that the ethnic music and cultural traditions of Indigenous Peoples in Siberia are not lost to the past.

OTYKEN’s songs reflect the daily life and traditions of Indigenous Peoples. “The Lord of Honey” is inspired by the Chulym beekeeping expertise and their ancient method of extracting honey, which remains unchanged to this day. OTYKEN also sell wild honey on their website, which is preserved in its natural state through sealed glass and wood packaging. The group has also made instructional videos on how to collect and season wild honey, as well as instructions on how to paint with propolis. All profits from the sale

Charlie Malcolm-McKay (CS INTERN)

All photos by Alexander Kupriyanov.

OTYKEN on the set of the "Genesis" music video in the forest.

of wild honey are directed toward the development of the OTYKEN collective.

Another of OTYKEN’s songs, “Storm,” garnered over 4 million views on YouTube within the first six months of its release. The music video and its visual aesthetic highlight the richness of their Khakassia and Chulym cultures. Set in the Krasnoyarsk Territory on the Chulym River, approximately 30 kilometers from the village of Pasechnoye, the capital of the Chulyms, this region holds significant cultural importance for the members of OTYKEN, as it is their birthplace. The band members are shown performing against a backdrop of rugged wilderness where the harsh, icy winds symbolize the resilience of the Indigenous Peoples who have inhabited the region for centuries. The song speaks to the challenges and difficulties faced by those who journey to the East, and the video is imbued with a sense of connection to the land.

As OTYKEN perform “Storm,” their traditional clothing, representative of many Indigenous Peoples of Siberia, pays homage to their people’s rich history and traditions. “It’s just like we revive them every time we sing our songs because it has always been in our hearts, and these traditions and stories will never die,” the group says. Among the array of musical instruments used in the music video, the morin khuur truly stands out for its distinct aesthetic of being made from a horse’s skull. This Mongolian string instrument is a testament to the resourcefulness and ingenuity of Indigenous Peoples, who have long used natural materials to create musical instruments.

OTYKEN celebrate the traditional roots of their music while experimenting with contemporary arrangements. Medonos, who is OTYKEN’s producer, helps strike a balance between R&B, ethnic rock, and tribal electronica. “We combine the traditions of the North, Siberia, and the Far East of Russia and modern industry trends. It is our producer, Andrey, who helps us to [frame] our narrative with [today’s] arrangements. There is a thin line where we cannot be misunderstood, so this is very important for us to present the authentic sound and context,” OTYKEN says.

Themes of nature, spirituality, and community are also important for OTYKEN, who value a close emotional connection to their fans: “Some of our songs have a truly magnificent effect on our listeners. The music touches many people, regardless of their nationality, location, and age. We get these messages sometimes on our social media, where people write to us, shedding their tears out and saying some moving things to us about the songs they heard. It’s the best reward for us to know that someone felt our song through them. Nothing can be compared to it.”

This connection with fans has helped OTYKEN gain exposure on a global scale with performances at festivals like the Universiade, the Freestyle Wrestling World Championship, and the Grammy’s Global Spin in 2022, where their hit song “Legend” earned them a Grammy nomination. OTYKEN’s music has also been selected to be sent to the moon as part of the Lunar Codex project. The technology used to digitize their music will ensure that their compositions, including “Genesis,” “Storm,” and “My Wing,” will be preserved for 1 million years. The Griffin astrobot lander, carrying a Polaris time capsule containing their music, is expected to reach the south lunar pole by 2024.

As OTYKEN looks to the future, they hope that their music and cultural message will continue to reach new heights: “There are many invitations for performances around the world, and of course we will continue working on our new music and making some developments on the sound and video quality. We would love to perform on the show “America’s Got Talent” in 2024. We were invited this spring, but it was decided to postpone it to next year. Our participation in such a show would be a great opportunity to expand our fan base in a way that more people would know about our Indigenous culture. This is something that we would love people all over the world to remember: cherish your culture and never forget about it.”

Tsveta playing the jaw harp.

FROM DUST WE ARE MADE

Members of the Wampanoag Nation Reclaim Historical Narratives in Plymouth, England

Hartman Deetz (MASHPEE WAMPANOAG)

Standing in the hills overlooking the coast of England’s Plymouth Harbor, in the distance, a group of Wampanoag has gathered in a Bronze Age stone circle. It is small and humble compared to its cousin to the east, the famous Stonehenge, but it is intimate and well suited for our needs. About 10 meters in diameter, the stones stand only 3 or 4 feet in height, but unlike its famous cousin, this circle is nearly forgotten. We can fully walk within this sacred circle; we can touch the stones. We turn to the East and begin our Song of Four Directions, making our offerings of wampum before turning and repeating to the South, West, and then the North.

Members of the Wampanoag Nation are here to connect to the land, the land of our colonizers, to stand in the circle once held sacred before the people here were colonized, before the Roman invasion of the Celts, before Hadrian’s Wall. As people connected to the Earth, this was an important step for our time in England.

In April 2023, we were brought across the ocean to perform a play, “We Are The Land,” as one of the last aspects of the commemoration of the 400-year anniversary of the Mayflower voyage that brought the colonizers to our shores, to the Plymouth on the other side of the Atlantic. The play and its production are a multilayered story, much like colonization itself.

Beginning in 2017, the English theater company, Theater Royal Plymouth, began the process of consultation with Wampanoag people, seeking to tell a more truthful version of the story that we have all come to know, of Pilgrims and Indians and Thanksgiving dinner. The story was to show in April 2020. And then COVID-19 hit.

For the Wampanoag people, the 400th anniversary of the Mayflower coinciding with the arrival of a societychanging pandemic and the added attack by the Trump administration on our sovereignty and jurisdictional authority was deeply ironic. But the stillness of the early days of the pandemic also offered a view of other possibilities. The stillness and clarity allowed for reflection, and the people at Theater Royal Plymouth asked themselves an important question: “Would the play be better if we had the Wampanoags write it themselves?”

For the staff at Theater Royal Plymouth, this was a real learning experience. We had to have a number of hard and frank discussions about what it takes to make this work a reality, about the difference between a community project, where actors volunteer for the chance to be on stage, versus the industry standard of expecting free labor from Indigenous communities. There is a need to look at how this fits a historical pattern of extraction and relies on an imbalance of power. But when all sides are truly committed, a mistake is an opportunity to learn.

Executive Director Mandy Precious said so eloquently in her speech at the wrap party that she “had learned,

The cast of “We Are The Land:” Wampanoag Nation Storytellers & The People’s Company.

Photo by Sarah Farrow-Jones.

through many missteps, so much in having to give up space, relinquish power, and recognize undue privileges.” The head of production, Hugh Borthwick, said, “It is amazing what can be accomplished when we stop worrying about who gets the credit for it and just get it done.” It has been an emotionally challenging process for all of us, but I truly commend the folks at Theater Royal Plymouth for sticking it out and showing the humility to commit to the hard work.

With the exception of three out of the 16 members of the cast and crew, the Wampanoag people involved were largely amateurs with little to no stage or theater experience. Siobhan Brown (Mashpee Wampanoag) took on the role of stage director for the play. Together with Siobhan, we made it a priority to approach the project in a decolonized way, as equals, all having important things to contribute. Even among ourselves, decolonizing is an ongoing process.

As for my part, I was able to help our group pull together the thousand and one ideas into a single cohesive storyline. We drew from the historians in the group to provide some of their favorite nuanced moments of everyday people, we looked to the cast members to help fill the void left out of the record with their own humanity, and we looked to Elders to draw from their own life experience and memory.

The truth is, we could never tell our whole story in an hour and 15 minutes on stage; our week of events sought to show a spectrum of who we are as a Peoples. We had presentations about the ongoing impacts of colonization, the work of Native Land Conservancy, a showing of the film “Mashpee Nine,” a discussion about police brutality and racial oppression, performances of our traditional Wampanoag Nation Singers and Dancers, and an evening of contemporary music organized by Asa Peters (Mashpee Wampanoag).

In the end, we were able to put 400+ years of our story on stage in 4 acts. Starting in the myth of our memory, the age of giants and prophecy, we skipped over the Mayflower arrival and moved into the after effects—the forced conversion, religious persecution, the seeds of discontent that brought about our war with the colonists, the racialized oppression that took root after we took on the Christian faith, the hypocrisy of a new nation founded on liberty, freedom, and justice for all (but not for “the merciless Indian savage”), to the neo-colonialism of redlining and gentrification that continue to force us out of our homelands to this day.

We laid the history of our experience out on the stage and then gave the cast the opportunity to speak of testaments to our hope and survival. These statements helped to pull us up from the depths, to show in the end we are more than the victims of the trauma we have endured, and that in spite of it all, we are vibrant, thriving people, real as the Earth itself.

Art is powerful because it allows us to imagine the world as we want it to be. The power of creation is sacred. It is how we serve our highest purpose, to have meaning to connect to our humanity and our spirit. To create beauty is to emulate the creator in our actions and our essence. More than essays facts and statistics, the conveying of our emotional reality to other human beings, to find space for empathy and connection, is how we overcome the dehumanizing powers of divide and conquer; that which divides us from our fellow human family, the animals and plants, and the whole system of life with whom we share this world.

Even here in England, the seat of one of the most expansive colonial powers the world has ever known, we were welcomed with a common thread of humanity. We were gifted Scottish tartans and eagle feathers. The Lord Mayor greeted us with real tears on her cheeks and gave a good speech in the lobby, saying we must learn from the past, but truly it is about what we do from here.

Colonization has impacted us all. The process has dehumanized both the colonized and the colonizer, and to regain our humanity we must come together to heal and repair the damage. When the offer was given to go out to a small stone circle on a quiet hillside above the outskirts of town, we jumped at the chance. I said to Sarah, our host, that the Druids were like England’s Indians; after all, everyone is indigenous to somewhere. As Wampanoags, we have been in our homeland as long as the English have been in England. Looking in the center of one of these stone circles, we saw fresh cut flowers had been placed as an offering.

Hartman Deetz (Mashpee Wampanoag) has been active in environmental and cultural stewardship for over 20 years. He is currently a 2023-2024 Cultural Survival Writer in Residence.

Members of the Wampanoag Nation are greeted by Plymouth’s Lord Mayor Sue Dann at the Mayflower Steps where the ship departed in 1620. Photo by Steven Hendricks.

The Magical Dreams of PAULA NICHO

Diana Pastor (MAYA K’ICHE’, CS STAFF)

Paula Nicho Cúmez (Maya Kaqchikel), originally from San Juan Comalapa (Chixot in Kaqchikel), Guatemala, inherited the art of weaving from her mother and eight sisters. Though she didn’t realize it at the time, as she warped and wove the threads, her path in the artistic world had already begun. One day, her grandfather, a second-generation apprentice to the first Chixot painter, told her, “The weaving you do is beautiful, but it is a laborious art.” Nicho and her sisters didn’t understand; for them, weaving was just an activity. Their grandfather, in addition to being a painter, was a designer of the community’s Easter carpets, which are handmade with custom-dyed sawdust or sand. When he saw the talent Nicho had for weaving, he said to her, “Why don’t you look for another medium besides weaving?”

Nicho didn’t become a painter as a child because painting was not common among women, but her grandfather’s comments planted the seed. Years later, Nicho married her husband Salvador, a painter, and he would water the seed that Nicho’s grandfather had planted in her. “Why don’t you pick up some brushes?” he suggested. “I encourage you to try to express yourself in this beautiful art! You can do many things because your weavings are beautiful, but in painting, it’s a whole other world.” Having the support of her grandfather and husband furthered Nicho’s desire to become a painter. “I thank God they were not sexist. There are many men who think that if you get married, you should only look after your family and take care of your husband. But both my husband and grandpa were open minded. I am very happy with my family,” she says.

Nicho says that even with her family’s support, the road to being recognized as a painter was difficult. When she started painting she formed a group with five other women, and the group received an invitation from UNESCO to present their paintings at a public event. Their ideas were original and unique as they aimed to express their own feelings and thoughts. The goal was not to copy the designs of the male painters of the community, and because of this, they received all kinds of feedback. Some said that their work was crazy and did not make sense, but others admired it. That is how Nicho and the other women came to call themselves surrealist Indigenous women painters of Guatemala.

Once, an art critic told them that surrealism was not from Guatemala, and said that “you should paint things proper to your country; you should change your name.” On another occasion, a different art critic showed up. He sought out Nicho and her group in Chixot, but some of the male painters in the community told the art critic that Nicho and her group were not from Comalapa, and that they were from a far away village. “But that wasn’t true,”

“Mi Segunda Piel (My Second Skin)” by Paula Nicho, 2004.

“Mas Allá del Universo (Beyond the Universe)” by Paula Nicho, 2005.

says Nicho. “We live in the same village as them.” So when Nicho and the other women painters opened a small gallery, they decided to call themselves “Kaqchikel Women Painters of Comalapa’’ to show that they, too, could dedicate themselves to art in their community.

Both Nicho’s painting and her painting style are in her blood. “I always dreamed of flying, and I had never had the opportunity to talk to my grandparents or consult a professional about the meaning of my dreams. One day, a psychologist saw my exhibition and sought me out to talk to me about what she saw in my paintings. She said, ‘I congratulate you. I know that someday your paintings will fly, and you, too, will fly to show your paintings.’ That gave me a lot of joy and inspiration,” says Nicho.

Since that encounter, Nicho gave free rein to her creativity and began painting many women, inspired by the sacrifice they make and how each one’s life unfolds. “Women wash, cook, take care of the family, take care of the food, and many more things. They are a source of inspiration,” she says, mentioning that one of the women she admires is Rosalina Tuyuc, a well-known Guatemalan human rights activist, with whom she has had the opportunity to talk. “I believe that we as women are capable of doing many things if we have the support of our family.”

In addition to her Indigenous identity and her identity as a woman, Nicho’s paintings have recurring themes such as the weight of history and nature. At times she has struggled to paint what she wants and to achieve recognition. “It wasn’t always easy. Sometimes I despaired, but art experts valued my work. When you travel, you find good friendships, both men and women,” she says. On her first international trip, Nicho met a collector from San Francisco. “We had the opportunity to bring 60 works and he started working with me. He makes promotional material with my art—cards and calendars, among other things. He has a very special eye. He told me that my style was magical realism because my paintings mix the day-to-day with the fantasy that comes from my imagination.

“Some women who have married have left their art halffinished. Others no longer want to paint because people don’t want to pay the price of paintings, and creating art is an investment. In Guatemala, most people don’t appreciate art. Still, I say that art has given me life. When I look back on my travel experiences, they seem like unforgettable dreams. I had the opportunity to make a trip to the opening of a Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian in the United States. I took a very special painting with me called “My Second Skin.” I made it because when I was little, there was no freedom to wear our traditional clothing. My mother made me a güipil (Indigenous blouse) from Comalapa and told me, ‘when you participate at the school parade, you will wear this. No one will have a dress like yours.’ But at school they told us all to wear the same blouse and skirts. It was a sad experience because I dressed in my traditional clothing and my mother went to

school with me. When the principal saw me like that, she said, ‘¡ixta!’ (you spoiled child!) My mother told me, ‘that’s how those people are, if you don’t improve this year at school, you’ll have to repeat the grade. Let’s go, you’re not going to participate in the parade.’ I remember the pain on my mother’s face, about to cry, and when we returned home she hugged me. I painted a woman who has figures on her skin because I believe that my clothing has value, and no one will tell me that it is useless. I feel that my clothing is like my second skin.

“Participating in that event at the Smithsonian was beautiful because we were also present during a march. Many Indigenous people came from different places. It was a huge event with people wearing all kinds of clothes. Experiences like that gave me the courage to continue painting what I wanted, what our grandparents have taught us. I believe that weaving is a way of healing, and painting works the same way. Making a work of art is inspiration put on canvas. The art I create represents Indigenous Peoples. My heart feels that we are not just a handful of people; there are many Indigenous people in the world.”

On her plans for the future and her art, Nicho says, “We still have a long way to go, but one of my projects with my daughters is to create my own website to make my paintings and theirs known.” She says she also wants to devote more time to her small art supplies store in town and expand it, since being in a small space does not allow her to feel totally free. Another long-term dream is to open a school to share her knowledge. And now that her children are grown, she has more time to paint.

Paula Nicho (Maya Kaqchikel) stands proudly in front of two of her paintings, left, “Cruzando Fronteras (Crossing Borders)” 2007.

OVERCOMING SHAME, BECOMING VISIBLE, AND CLAIMING SÁMI IDENTITY Through

Spoken Word

Camilla Lindschouw (CS INTERN)

Ida Helene Benonisen (Sámi) is a Queer spoken word poet based in Oslo, Norway. Together with Asha Abdullahi, a hijabi woman, they have created a venue, Blue Monday, hosting performances, poetry nights, workshops, and other community events every month. Benonisen’s projects unite Sámi artists and artists from other minorities to reflect the power of community, unity, and understanding through universal languages.

Benonisen is Sámi, but like many others, they did not grow up in Sámi culture. They attribute this cultural loss to Norway’s assimilation politics, which, while officially terminated in the 1960s, continued to have a negative impact on their grandparent’s generation. “My grandparents are the age of the people that were taken away from their families and forced into schools to be assimilated. [My family] lost our language a generation ago, and I grew up in a family where the shame of being Sámi was strong. This is not a unique story. It is common for Sámi people that being Sámi is a family secret...because it was the only way to survive for a lot of families,” Benonisen says.

The journey of turning shame into pride and claiming their Sámi identity has been a long struggle for Benonisen. “Because of the shame in my family,

I have always felt this huge void within me because I knew I was missing something. I knew I wanted to speak my language and that I wanted to connect with my culture, that I wanted to know who I was. I did not get a sense of pride until later on in life; I only started connecting with my Sámi family in my early 20s,” Benonisen says and explains how they were not alone on this journey. “I like to see it as if it were my ancestor’s whispers that were so strong that they reached me. It came to a point where I didn’t feel like I had a choice anymore. I had to be allowed to know who I was. I had to make this silence into screams. I had to speak the words that were only being whispered.”

Poetry and storytelling are intrinsic parts of Sámi culture, and to Benonisen, a key reason that their culture survived assimilation efforts—the Sámi never stopped telling stories. “The closer I came to finding myself and coming back to my culture, it was natural for me to bring my art with me,” they explain. “I explore the identity and shame part of my journey in my poetry. I was given a voice in the Sami community because of my poetry. It was very natural for me to use my poetry as a platform to talk about how it feels to be like I am a result of a very successful assimilation policy, [that] I became what the government wanted me to be. I use my platform to talk about the grief and heartbreak and everything that comes along with being assimilated because I feel like they stole so much from me.”

One of Benonisen’s favorite poems is about the beginning of becoming themself. “It’s about an animal in a cage that looks like nature, and how it is a part of creating the solution for it lives within the solution itself. It is easier to live inside of this solution than breaking down the walls of the cage. For the people watching the animal, it is much more comfortable to watch a wild animal within a cage than in the real world.” Benonisen says this poem summarizes their journey of claiming their true identity: “I had to break down those walls to become who I am. I am not supposed to be living within this illusion of being free when I am not.”

Benonisen’s fight against shame and assimilation differs from the racism experienced by Sámi people who have grown up within Sámi culture, and Benonisen says they feel privileged to have been free from that. “But the thing about being Sámi, whether you are born into it or if you have been assimilated, no matter what, it is a fight,” Benonisen says as they talk about the projects they have created with other Sámi artists. “I like how our voices can coexist in the same pieces, how we speak to each other and how we speak together about what the government did to us. They are different experiences, but within the same system...I think it is good that I can use my voice to talk about my perspective on things,” they explain.

The idea of different struggles coexisting forms the foundation for the creative venue Benonisen and Abdullahi have run for the past two years. “[We have] created a space where all kinds of minorities can feel welcome, where they can come and share and perform their experiences. As an Indigenous group, it is so important that we work together with other

Ida Helene Benonisen (Sámi).

ethnic minorities because we live in a racist system. I think that working together against that system and sharing experiences makes us stronger. I like to believe that [our venue] is a safe space for minorities of different backgrounds,” says Benonisen.

As Benonisen grew engaged in activism, it became a natural evolution for them to use poetry as an outlet for their activism. Activism is not simply about protesting, but about making people understand intersecting experiences of oppressive systems. “It is important to me to use my poetry to explain how racism affects us also as white-skinned people within different spaces and to create a more united antiracist front in Norway. I use my poetry to try and make people understand certain experiences,” they say. Poetry has become a political tool to Benonisen, a development that has helped them to “become more confident in that [I] can write good poetry on the spot and use the resources within [myself] to express [experiences of oppression],” Benonisen says.

Benonisen considers the invisibility of the Sámi as a central struggle: “We are people with strong roots, a lot of pride and resilience, but when you look like the colonizer, it is easy to disappear. As a white Indigenous group, we feel invisible to the majority a lot of the time.” This invisibility makes possible the racism experienced among Sámi, internalized or externalized, the land dispossession, and the shame. “People don’t believe us. Kids today are learning in school about the Sámi like we are some mythical creature that once existed. We are not visible, and that makes it easy for people to ignore our struggles. It makes it easier for the government to continue discriminating against us. I believe that the assimilation politics are still very much alive,” Benosisen says while appreciating and acknowledging the privilege attached to having white skin despite experiencing discrimination towards their Sámi identity.

Poetry is not just a personal outlet for Benonisen to navigate their journey from shame to claiming Sámi identity with pride. It has also become a powerful political tool to make the majority understand oppressive systems and their detrimental effects on those it oppresses. “[Poetry] is an outlet for my frustration. I carry so many emotions: I am angry, I am upset. I feel a lot of love for my culture, for the Sámi people and our allies. All these feelings of anger, sadness, love, community—poetry is the way I know how to express those feelings.”

Spoken word poetry makes the invisible visible. It is a universal language where, Benosisen says, “I can speak a language that people do not understand and they will still feel something, the energy. They can read my body language. Spoken word is more than just words. It is your body. It is the feelings, the soul, it is the level you are speaking. You make people hear and see you. They can look away but they are still going to hear me. They can close their ears, and they will still see me.”

We ARE

By Ida Helene Benonisen

We are

Children of the mighty sun itself

We are

The joik that fills the gaps between Nordland’s trees

We are summer nights in the midnight sun

We are the circle in the flag where red meets blue

We are tough against the soft Where the sea crashes against the sheer mountain

We have treaded terrain unknown to others

We are the song and the circle that never shatters

We are past and present

We are Elsa Laula Renberg

We are Ella Marie Hætta Isaksen

We are fighting spirit and love

We are toil and mercy

We are hope and we are sorrow

So we know we are able to face tomorrow

And sometimes you don’t see us But we are We are We ARE

And today we fill the north, south, west, and east With red, blue, yellow, and green And we are

Because of those who carried on Even after you gave them deep deep scars

For the greatest of all is the unity we hold tight between our palms, between folded hands and praying hands

And today we remember All we are

And all we long for We are strong

And the children of mighty sun itself

And we are We are

We are

Right where we belong

COLONIALISM, CAPITALISM, AND CLIMATE CONCERNS

A CONVERSATION WITH METALWORK MASTER BRUCE CAESAR

Bobbie Chew Bigby (CHEROKEE)

Across much of Indian Country, Bruce Caesar (Pawnee/Sac and Fox) is well known for his exquisite metalwork and jewelry. With the meticulous attention to fine details that each piece reflects, Caesar’s metal creations are highly sought after, whether they are crowns adorning the newly named princesses of Tribal Nations, roach spreaders worn by male dancers, or the lucky customer who has managed to purchase his jewelry reflecting Native American church motifs like the waterbird. Caesar’s metalsmithing talents have also earned him the honor of being named a National Heritage Fellow by the National Endowment for the Arts in 1998. On nearly any given weekend, Caesar and his family can be found across the Oklahoma powwow circuit at booths selling this fine jewelry ranging from pins and earrings to bracelets, hatbands, and rings.

Caesar is an important link in the tradition of metalsmithing that has run in his family for generations. The tradition was handed down from his father, renowned Pawnee metalsmith Julius Caesar, and his Meskwaki maternal grandfather, Bill Leaf, and now continues through the work of his son, Adam. The primary medium used by the Caesar family has been German silver, a non-ferrous alloy of nickel, copper, and zinc. Also called nickel silver, this metal alloy has been the foundation upon which the tradition of southern plains Native American metal work

has grown and thrived, drawing on an amalgamation of certain transition metals now highly sought after in the transition to electric vehicles. Containing no silver, German silver has long been utilized among Native artisans for its characteristics of being more lightweight, less easily tarnished, and more affordable compared with sterling silver. With approximately six decades of experience in metalsmithing, Caesar reflects back on his time as a little boy watching his father work at night as one of the formative experiences in training him in this unique craft. Most of those techniques and the tools he uses, including many in his collection that were handmade by his father, have remained exactly the same. He starts by using a pencil to draw the design onto the metal, then uses a jeweler’s saw, metal shears, or cold chisel to cut out the design and carefully fill the metal before using his trusty wooden dapping block to shape it. Stamps, anvils, and ball peen hammers can be used for the meticulous art of engraving the piece before it is finally polished, attached to any chains or hooks, and ready for wear.

Reflections in German Silver

German silver’s documented origins are traced to the 1820s, first being produced in the town of Hildburghausen, Germany. Yet Caesar believes that the true beginnings of this alloy actually go back much further to the time of the European Dark Ages, when alchemists constantly experimented with all manner of materials in order to create the metals that were most coveted—silver and gold. Caesar

Bruce Caesar in his Oklahoma studio.

The assortment of tools Bruce uses in working with German silver. Most of these tools were made by or handed down from his father, Julius Caesar.

asserts that German silver “was meant to be deceptive as it was meant to replace the silver that everyone was trading at the time; it was cost effective, a total financial gain to have a metal mixed of nickel, copper and zinc be passed off as sterling silver,” he explains.

While German silver is malleable and polishes well, it is harder than sterling silver owing to the density and hardness of the nickel, its primary component. Caesar points out that this alloy is good for making large pieces and adornment items that will not necessarily be worn directly against the skin due to the likelihood of allergies people can have to nickel, copper, and zinc. “I warn people about German silver,” he says. “I tell them that this metal was not made for anything but profit; it wasn’t meant to be great for jewelry making. People say that this metal is traditional and, well, traditional only goes so far.”

This re-thinking of ‘traditional’ in relation to southern plains Native American German silver pieces goes back to some of the first encounters and trade between European settlers in the Americas and Native Peoples. While tension and conflict characterized many of these early encounters, the historical narrative has often touted the exchange of trade goods between Native and non-Native Peoples as unequivocally positive. Many of these new trade items, ranging from glass beads to tools such as axes and hammers, would radically transform countless aspects of Native daily life, material culture, and artistic expression. Caesar has another perspective on this narrative. He points out that while many of these items introduced through European trade were of benefit to Native Peoples, several of the materials acquired through trade had potentially harmful and unknown consequences for Tribes. For example, arsenic, then used as a black dye for clothing, was also introduced during this era.

Linking German silver’s invention and spread primarily to economic motivations of profit-making and consumption, Caesar draws direct lines not only between German silver and the colonial experience of Native American people, but also fundamentally to the capitalist and consumerbased economic system in which we live today: “People trying to make money is a driving, dominant force in a capitalistic society that unfortunately has played a large role in driving the existence of America and how it’s been utilized, trampled on, and consumed,” he says. “The reason America is one of the strongest, wealthiest nations on earth is that everything was free. All [colonists] had to do was kill us, and they did. In that process, all the gold, silver, precious metals, timber, water, land...all of this became what is called wealth. America is a rich country that is being depleted.”

A painful irony is that many Native Nations, while living on lands now called the United States, within the world’s most economically developed country, are themselves often struggling economically. This state of being “beggars in our own country,” as Caesar describes the predicament, has been the resulting outcome of marginalization, dispos-

session, and the forceful imposition of a capitalistic economy that demands endless growth and profit-making.

But of course, humans are not the only ones impacted in this broader picture. Caesar says, “There are elements in this world that are available for creating more of what consumers want—computers, microchips, batteries—but we are wearing out the portion of this world that we as humans can exist in. Destroying our oxygen generators and our water sources, we’re right on the edge of it.” The idea that the elemental gifts of this world are not limitless and do not follow a capitalistic economic logic of growth and consumption is paramount to Caesar’s worldview. Additionally, he supports finding ways to avoid fossil fuels, recognizing that we must deal with the consequences of what we have taken from the ground, such as oil, gas, and coal, and now put into our air and waters.

At a larger level, Caesar articulates his belief in the agency of the earth as a powerful living system. “We as humans are just players, we’re not the main thing. Earth is just part of a larger system. We didn’t make the Earth, but we can sure mess it up. And that’s what we’re doing— destroying our [human] capacity to exist. Once this world is done with us, it still has a long time to go.” Caesar’s reflections on the consequences of modern human actions are sobering, but his attitude remains upbeat and positive, qualities he is known for just as much as his meticulously detailed metalwork. As his attention returns to his work on the German silver slab, he says, “I believe that creating things is something that the Creator put in us.” Caesar’s thoughts and work navigate this delicate balance between man as destroyer and creator in relationship to our living world. Ultimately, Caesar remains committed to inspiring and uplifting people through this creative tradition that was handed down to him.

Bobbie Chew Bigby (Cherokee) is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Waterloo in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, where she researches the intersections between Indigenous-led tourism and resurgence.

All photos by Bobbie Chew Bigby.

Some of Bruce's German silver creations include the two pins at top, which depict a fancy dancer and Apache fire dancer. At left are a pair of horse earrings and at right are waterbird earrings.

DECOLONIZING INDIGENOUS ART in South Africa

Lukretia Booysen (Griekwa, Nama) is an Indigenous changemaker and founder and curator of the Koena Art Institute, an Indigenous heritage preservation space, in Cape Town, South Africa. Her work is about more than preservation; it is a celebration of Indigenous people and their heritage. Booysen started in the arts about eight years ago after she was approached by an Indigenous artist who asked her to represent him, even though she knew little about art at the time. A week later, she sold her first art piece and began representing her first Indigenous artist, which became the beginning of the Koena Art Institute. Shaldon Ferris (Khoisan), Cultural Survival Indigenous Rights Radio Coordinator, recently spoke with Booysen.

Cultural Survival: Please tell us about your work.

Lukretia Booysen: The Koena Art Institute is an organization that celebrates Indigenous heritage through art. We are an Indigenous-owned, led, and managed organization that tells stories by Indigenous artists through the Indigenous lens and experience, informed by Indigenous knowledge systems. Currently in the art scene in South Africa, for Indigenous artists there is still a long way to go in terms of inclusion. It is an uphill struggle to get our work recognized as an art form and included in the broader artistic landscape. The Koena Art Institute, in conjunction with Iziko Museums and Iziko Co-Curator Annelize Kotze, has come together to put on an exhibition called “The Evolution of Indigenous Arts.”

Iziko Museums is an organization that has stood the test of time and is also a state entity that represents arts, history, natural history, and archaeology. They have played such a big role in preserving history. So for us as a startup organization, being able to work with this organization is really affirming. It is really a groundbreaking and historic event

for us as an Indigenous organization. Being able to work with Iziko and learning and understanding how the environment functions has been such an amazing experience. The team, the staff, everybody has just made us feel so at home.

CS: What is this exhibition about and why did it come to be?

LB: This exhibition talks about how our ancestors were some of the oldest known artists in the world. This is prevalent in rock art across the globe. Yet, not much has been published on the evolution of Indigenous arts, what Indigenous artists are doing today, and how they relate to the art as Indigenous beings. This exhibition will be in the South African Museum where the Rock Art Institute is. It’s going to be the marriage of our ancestors’ art and stories and their traditions with the art and the works of current Indigenous descendants. It is extremely exciting and meaningful to us to have an organization like Iziko Museums, which is one of the most established arts structures in our country, exhibit our work. It is a six-month exhibition that will be part of the educational program, which is very exciting for us because a lot of young people will be able to see that our art forms have not died, our people have not died. We still practice and we still celebrate who we are as a people and as artists. I personally believe that we are a nation of artists. Our Indigenous South African Griekwa people are known for music. They’re known for moon celebrations. They are known for dance. They are known for art and storytelling.

CS: Why do you consider this exhibition to be so important for the young generation?

LB: Historically in South Africa, we have been classified as Coloured. Because of that, a lot of our people have had

At the opening of “Evolution of Indigenous Art” at the Iziko South African Museum in February. Ulric Roberts (Nama), center right, in front of his work.

some form of cultural erasure and disconnect from their ancestry and their history. So to have a child of Indigenous descent see artwork that represents them, it’s something that is really mind shifting, something that is really awakening, and something that not only speaks to cultural preservation but also to how we face and foster future generations who are Indigenous and who also are artists. How will they know that they have the right to celebrate that and their natural talent that comes through them as Indigenous artists and those stories that they will be able to tell? It is such a pleasure to be able to bring something like this to young minds and young children.

CS: What is the objective of this exhibition?

LB: The objective is basically continuation. It is preservation, it is futurism, it is participation. It is inclusion and creating space for Indigenous stories that are being told by Indigenous Peoples.

It is with great honor and privilege that we celebrate Indigenous voices. It is with great honesty and artistic integrity that we have embarked on advancing the preservation of Indigenous heritage. The work is sometimes challenging, but it’s so affirming to our community that speaks from the periphery, and we speak with pride. We are joining so many that have come before us through this exhibition to lead the charge for self-performing through our Indigenous lens. The exhibition explores art by contemporary Indigenous descendants and shares how these stories, arts, and ideas that are intrinsic to ancestry have continued through time.

Creating this platform for sharing Indigenous stories and art has been at the forefront of the Koena Art Institute, so it’s a celebration. It’s a celebration of our history, which is merging with current realities and experiences by our artists, communities, and South Africans in general. This exhibition shows that Indigenous art is not stagnant. It is dynamic, it is complex, it’s fluid, and it’s not static. It changes every single day, all the time, in subtle, yet tangible ways.

CS: Is there a comparison to be made between ancient Indigenous art and modern Indigenous art?

LB: Indigenous art, which is derived from rock arts, and modern Indigenous art forms have so many similarities because it is all informed by the ancient. It is informed by our ancestors’ way of living, translating that in a contemporary context. It also speaks to the way that we live, the way that we understand, and the way that we express our work as artists, as musicians, as poets, as storytellers, as theater-makers, and as Indigenous beings overall.

The comparison that one can make is that you can see how this evolution is taking place. It is a beautiful experience because what we do today will determine what in 100 years will, too, be seen as ancestor work. So,

in essence, we are the ancestors of tomorrow. Being able to do this exhibition in the way that we are doing it is a positioning. It is creating a historic landmark and sense of pride that generations from today, youth and people and the whole world, will be able to see how our stories evolved through time through art.

CS: Who are the featured artists for the “Evolution of Indigenous Art” exhibition?

LB: Andries Dirks, who is from Ribeeck Vallei; Anthony Roach from the Eastern Cape; Colin the Bushman from Worcester, Western Cape; Marlene Liebenberg from the Eastern Cape; Garth Erasmus from the Western Cape; Pierre Cloete from the Northern Cape; Stanley Grootboom from Knysna, Tsitsikama; Mamakwedza Mutasa from Zimbabwe; Ulrich Roberts also from the Northern Cape, Namakwaland; and Hendrius Vaalbooi from the Kalahari.

CS: Where is the exhibition? How long will it run?

LB: The exhibition will be held at the Rock Art Institute at the South African Museums from April 1 to August 31, 2023. It will be possible to visit during opening hours, subject to the electricity supply. When there is load shedding, unfortunately, viewers will not be able to come. But it is open to the public along with the education programs so children will get to experience the exhibition.

Top: “Madam” by Andries Dirks.

Middle: “Rider” by Pierre Cloete (Khoi).

Bottom: “Icon” by Anthony Roach.

BUILDING CHAMORRO COMMUNITY Through the Arts

Jayna Shoda Meyer (CHAMORRO)

In the Mariåna Islands, there is a word in the Chamorro language for a deep feeling of longing— mahålang. Mahålang has several translations, including the feeling of being lonely, missing someone, something, or some place; homesick. Growing up as a Chamorro in the continental United States, I always had this feeling of mahålang. Longing for a place I was not in, longing for a sense of belonging, longing for community. It was a deeply rooted, subconscious longing and missing of something I didn’t know how to define. I didn’t realize what I was longing for until I returned to my mother’s home island of Saipan in 2021 after years of being away.

I returned to the house my grandparents built and raised their five children in, tucked in the small village of Chalan Piao on the southern side of the island. A lush agri-jungle, as my grandpa calls it, the land is plentiful in local plants and trees—mannga (mango), bilembines (star fruit), åtes (custard apple), niyok (coconut), lemmai (breadfruit), aga (banana). A garden, started by my late Grandma Lou and nourished now by my Grandma Evelyn, blesses the front of the house with a sweet, floral aroma. When it rains in Chalan Piao, the smell of the earth becomes extra palpable. I would sit in the driveway with my cousin at night and we’d look up at the moon together, discussing family and culture and land and responsibility. She would tell me taotaomo’na stories.

Taotaomo’na translates to the “people of before.” In the islands, they’re known as spirits. Some protect you, some tease you. The Chamorro Peoples have a long history of venerating ancestors. We believe that your spirit doesn’t leave when you pass on. At night, their presence becomes more known—they are most active at dusk or dawn. The humid night air, thick with the aroma of the garden and the sweat of the earth my grandparents built our family home

on, unlocks my soul. My heart beams, this is home. The smell in the night air when it rains in Saipan speaks to the feeling of mahålang I have always wanted to satisfy.

Many Chamorros travel away from home; the Chamorro People indigenous to the Mariåna Islands have a long history of migration. The archipelago of 14 islands, located in the northern Pacific Ocean, was first populated thousands of years ago by navigators. Now, only the four southernmost islands are permanently populated: Guåhan, Rota, Tinian, and Saipan. Throughout history, Chamorros would travel between islands within the Mariånas for trade, resources, and family (my grandparents currently go back and forth between Saipan and Guåhan). The Chamorro people have been resilient through Spanish, German, Japanese, and American colonization, traveling to different corners of the global empires controlling our islands. Today, we have a far-reaching diaspora with Chamorros around the world.

When the wind fills our sails, how do we stay connected to home? As a diasporic Chamorro who was raised in California, has lived in the Mariånas, and attended theater school in Boston, I have grown accustomed to being mahålang. The further I travel, the more longing for community I have—searching for a community who shares the same feeling of mahålang as I do.

I have found a strong community that transcends location through Breaking Wave Theatre Company. While based in Guåhan, Breaking Wave has leadership and members across the country and the globe, creating a wide web of interconnected theater artists who know Guåhan as home. I approached CJ Ochoco, the president of Breaking Wave, in December of 2021 with an idea of creating a new, devised work that combined traditions of oral storytelling with contemporary theater. Despite having only had a one-hour conversation several months before, she embraced my idea with full support, and the Oral Storytelling Project was born.

Scenes from performances by the Breaking Wave Theatre Company. Photos courtesy of Breaking Wave Theatre Company.

Inspired by interviews with Elders, the Oral Storytelling Project is a Chamorro theater work currently in development that aims to tell stories between generations. The intention of this project is to honor our ancestors and manamko’ (Elders), take pride in Chamorro culture and identity, know our history, and pass down stories to future generations. We want to break the mold of western forms of theater and put Chamorro stories on stage. Our team is composed of five Chamorro writers—Curtis J. Jewell, Eddie Acfalle Jr., Jayna Lizama, Joni Aguon, and Mia Alvarez—and two Chamorro directors, Joyce Torres and myself. As a hybrid in-person/virtual creative process, we have collaborated together in the same room and from across the world.

Our process began with a two-week writer’s workshop in July of 2022, held in a hybrid format with in-person and virtual participants. We met every day to build community and establish trust with each other, learn more about the interviewees, explore creative writing exercises, and generate new work. In this time, we crafted Community Agreements based on our shared values—a list that we continue to read aloud every time we meet. During these two weeks, we established a foundation as a community and a creative collective.

After the two weeks finished, we transitioned fully to Zoom. We spanned four time zones from Guåhan to New York and met at the same time despite a 14-hour time difference. Twice a month, we’d meet in the Zoom room to write together, review each other’s work, or for a workshop from a guest artist. The energy in the Zoom room was as palpable as it had been in July. Our sessions were filled with gratitude, discoveries, excitement, and joy for the creative process. Creating in community with this group of artists was a remedy for the mahålang in my soul. We shared laughs and tears and celebrated wins big and small. It is not easy to work on Zoom, or to work from different parts of the world at completely different times in the day. But it was always worth it to be in community with other Chamorros, to hear our language and our stories.

This project has brought together Chamorros from the Marianas and the diaspora, building a bridge between two different branches of the community. Some were Guåhan-born and raised, some born in Guåhan and moved in the diaspora, some diaspora-born and raised; all of us wanted to deepen our connection with family, culture, and identity. I have witnessed through this process the power of storytelling in community. Talking story is a longstanding Chamorro tradition. We are natural storytellers. Our stories hold knowledge and history. The act of creating art in community is a healing practice.

In writing stories from family members to share with future generations, the Oral Storytelling Project has evoked a connection to lineage past, present, and future. We understand the importance of knowing those who came before us and want to ensure their legacies live on. Many attempts have been made to bury our history and our culture through colonization, conversion, war, migration. Moving to the diaspora can act as a form of erasure. It requires the individual to stay rooted in community and listen to the feeling of mahålang. To remember home and return home.

In fall of this year, we will share what the writers have created with a performance for the community in Guåhan. The script is a collection of stories, memories, and poems— a marriage of the writers’ experiences and the stories they gathered from their loved ones. We are bringing these stories to life through theater, an artform that requires community. Community to create with and share with.

Since the beginning, we have said that it is not about the final product but about the process; the process of listening, asking questions, collaboration, respecting differences, learning, finding new paths forward, believing in ourselves. And above all, the importance of continuing traditions of storytelling. If we don’t write them, who will? Anggen ti hita pues hayi? If not us, then who?

Jayna Shoda Meyer (Chamorro) is a 2023 Cultural Survival Indigenous Youth Fellow.

Members of the Oral Storytelling Project.

Photo courtesy of Jayna Shoda Meyer.

SHARING GOOD INTENTIONS FOR INNER PEACE THROUGH KENÉ

Indigenous artists are often pigeonholed and face significant obstacles to being recognized by the contemporary art world. The Harlem, New York-based Shipibo Conibo Center is working to change the perceptions about Indigenous art and break barriers for Indigenous artists. According to the Center, their mission is to “[promote] and [perpetuate] the creative lifeways of the Shipibo-Konibo People of the Peruvian Amazon in such a way that [will] benefit its practitioners. With a focus on Indigenous self-determination and territorial sovereignty as well as visual arts, music, and ethnobotanical research—which in the Shipibo-Konibo lifeway are inseparable realms—the organization’s mission is motivated by the conviction that Indigenous identity does not belong to a romanticized ancient age, but rather to a technologically-anchored and sustainable future.”

The Shipibo Conibo Center and the contemporary Indigenous artists that they represent sign a reciprocity agreement, according to which the work of art and the work of environmental activism towards Indigenous sovereignty in the Peruvian Amazon cannot be separated. This unique framework aims to change the colonial paradigms that have separated Indigenous artists from the context of contemporary art and to establish a model for reuniting the realms of art, healing, ecology, and politics that were separated through colonial and neocolonial modes of extraction and representation—and in doing so, to change the topdown structures of conservation and philanthropic circles.

Sara Flores, from the community of Tanbo Mayo in Peru, is one of the artists represented by the Center and one of the most prominent Shipibo painters to have emerged recently into the contemporary art circuits. Flores employs and recasts Kené—a style of geometric patterns representing the spiritual and moral values of the Shipibo-KoniboXetebo Nation and their reciprocal relationship with nature—through seemingly infinite creative innovations to create in freehand a hypnotic maze of patterns with

complex, vibrational power. Matteo Norzi, Executive Director of the Shipibo Conibo Center, recently spoke with Flores on behalf of Cultural Survival.

You have said in previous articles that you were born to be an artist. Can you explain what you mean by this?

Sara Flores: We, the Shipibo, have Spanish names, but also “true names” that were used prior to European colonization. True names are kept confidential or used for intimate settings, only among family. They are conferred on us in different circumstances by grandparents. We are named after someone skilled, hardworking, or strong, so that when we grow older, we share some of those same qualities. [We are given a name] by the midwife at the time when the newborn’s umbilical cord is cut. You can call me Sara Flores, but my true name is Sui Biri. The terms describe something dazzling, beautiful to watch, smooth and well ordered. Funnily enough, this is just what they say when they talk about my work.

Kené translates into Spanish as “design.” I learned all the teachings that were shown to me in my childhood and adolescence from my mother while I stayed with her. She not only taught me Kené but also the kenebo, the designs. There are many designs, beginning with the shapes and patterns of the leaves, the fruits, the scales of the fish, of fins and tails, of insects, and the designs of the animals, such as the otorongo (jaguar), or the designs of the different structures of the plants and lianas (climbing plants, vines). And within them are the designs of ayahuasca and the clavo huasca vines. [My mother] taught me how to differentiate the designs of the paiche, one of the largest freshwater fish, and also the designs of the snakes and the boas. Not only did my mother teach me these things, but also in the sky, about the positions of the stars, the moon and the sun, and the positions of the clouds and the rainbows, and about the designs of the different flowers and

All photos courtesy of the artist; the Shipibo Conibo Center, NY; White Cube, London;

Sara Flores in 2022.

Photo by Matteo Norzi.

their colors. To make Kené, a painted design, one should take into account the different designs and all these elements and values with their various colors and shades.

What do Kené motifs and patterns signify?

SF: The meaning of the pattern of the Kené is the spirituality and ethics of my Peoples. It is the feeling of our existence as a developed society of our millennial culture and that continues to evolve as a Peoples and culture, without losing the ecological human cultural pattern. As a society that persists in tropical forests, we will never lose our cultural thread. It will endure in the society of the future.

What is your process for creating your artwork, and what role do materials have in this process?

SF: Everything I paint first appears in me. Sometimes, I cannot dismiss the patterns from my mind. I go to sleep and they appear, forming on the threads of the mosquito net. I close my eyes but I keep on seeing them. They come to me in dreams. For the realization of the art, the first thing is concentration. I have to keep a steady hand to outline and execute the design, keeping a focused mind so as not to make mistakes on the horizontal or vertical lines. The materials that I use are already prepared beforehand. I create my designs with natural paints using the bark of yacushapana trees, almonds, mahogany, guava, or green banana peels. A very special mud is used to fix with the pigments from the barks. Once everything is prepared and mixed with the mud, the colors change from brown to black. This is done by drying on a cloth that is made of tocuyo, which is a product of wild cotton.

Finally, we use natural colors for the filling of the different designs. We use the red from the achiote (a dye extracted from the seeds of the Bixa orellana shrub), the yellow from the palillo or guisador (turmeric), and spinach for the green color. The important thing is that everything I use is extracted from nature, without damaging the environment, and asking the plants and their spirits for permission.

There are areas that have been invaded by settlers where there are no longer any plants. When I was a little girl, I learned to paint with a small aquatic tree called jene joshón. We used to harvest it just behind the village where

a small stream flowed, where the great anaconda Ronín lived. Ronín is the ruler of the waters, mother of all mothers. Then [the settlers] came and started to throw litter and garbage everywhere. They polluted the waters. Ronín left, and so did the waters with her. Today the stream is no longer there; it dried up, and that is why I can’t paint my Kené with jene joshón anymore.

You have said that visual arts and Kené patterns have healing powers. Can you describe this relationship between Kené art and the healing of a human experiencing it?

SF: Kené is used for inner peace, to maintain the balance of a very active mind. In my work, I try to be very humble and generous. It is a way of curing the fabric itself, putting love and dedication into the repetitiveness of the work, so that the people who later see the work can also feel those good intentions for their inner peace. It is important to remember that the more natural the looms and paintings are, the less polluting they will be. In one way or another, the colors serve as guides for healthy eating. Medicinal plants for traditional cures are used as dyes for my designs.

What is your understanding of the interconnectedness among Indigenous art, specifically the Kené tradition, environmental activism, and the fight for Indigenous sovereignty?

SF: Each color is a plant; each plant is a place, a place in the jungle, a place from my childhood. Returning to those places, continuing to establish a connection with nature is a form of cultural resistance. It is our way of continuing to care for the forest. I take my daughters and granddaughters there. I show them the plants. We, Shipibo, are the guardians of our territory. It is by living in those places that we continue to protect them.

In addition, with the sales of my works, through a reciprocity pact, [my] art is in service of territorial resistance, supporting the important organizational work of our people towards the dream of self-determination as an Indigenous Nation. My Kené is painted on the flag of the Shipibo-Konibo-Xetebo Nation.

Left: “Untitled” (Maya Kené 2, 2019) by Sara Flores. Vegetal dyes on wild cotton canvas.

Right: “Untitled” (Shao Maya Punté Kené 1, 2021) by  Sara Flores. Vegetal dyes on wild cotton canvas.

A TRADITION UNDER THREAT

Tattoo Arts of Indigenous Women in Nepal

Dev Kumar Sunuwar (KOĨTS-SUNUWAR, CS STAFF) Anoj Tharu (THARU)

In Nepal, tattooing has long been an integral part of life, culture, and identity for many Indigenous communities, particularly for Tharu Indigenous women from the southern parts of the country. Tharu Indigenous Peoples live in over 20 districts in the southern plains in Nepal. According to the 2011 Census, their population is 1.73 million. Tharu Peoples have their own district language, culture, rituals, customs, and lifeways.

Tattooing is an art that is distinct from other forms of expression. However, the practice of traditional tattooing is fading in popularity, especially among younger generations. Tattoos among Tharu women carry different stories. Inspired mostly by nature, Tharu women traditionally used tattoos to carry forward their traditional values and cultural identities. In some regions, it was compulsory for young girls before marriage, and for married women, especially on the legs. Tharu communities are animists and believe in the forest goddess Bandevi and other nature-based deities. The tattoos reflect these beliefs.

“I was inspired while looking at others and I tattooed my legs only with a few symbols. All my friends back then, in my early teens, would tattoo their bodies,” says Somali Tharu, 75, living in Bashgadhi Municipality-4, Laxmanpur. “After giving birth to two babies, I tattooed my hands and other parts of my body, mainly with the symbols of birds, harin (deer), mayur (peacocks), weavings, a cooking pot, and machiya (wooden table), and [I] had a tika (mark on the forehead) done.

“My grandmother and my mother had tattoos throughout their bodies and I followed the tradition. All my female relatives had tattoos on their bodies. I don’t know why people stopped tattooing tikas. In the past, Tharu men also used to get tattooed with a few symbols, such as their name and symbols of birds or flowers. When people would ask their name, they would show their hand. Tharu women would put various marks on their hands, legs and face,” Tharu says.

The term for tattoos in the Tharu language is khodna, or godna. They are done in patterns such as lines, dots, and crosses on the arms, legs, and chest, and reflect elements in nature, such as badam butta (groundnut shrub), suraj ke daali (rays of the sun), supari ke gacha (betel nut palm), along with peacocks, cooking pots, snakes, temples, and hearts, among others.

Tattoos are believed to be a protection from being kidnapped and kept as enslaved people by royals, who apparently disliked tattoos of Indigenous cultures. Tattoos were, and are, also used for enhancing beauty. They are regarded as a lifelong ornament on women. However, Tharu youth are not getting traditional tattoos, and experienced tikaniyas (tattoo artists) are hard to come by in the villages. Instead, western tattoos have become increasingly fashionable and trendy and use modern tattooing guns and other non-traditional methods.

“This is the symbol of bird, machiya, mayur, hasiya (sickle), and this is venta (Nepali eggplant),” says Lalrani Tharu, 52, from Bashgadhi-4. “I don’t know the reasons behind the tattoos, but I like tattooing. Back then, we did not go to school. After completing housework, we friends

Somali Tharu (Tharu) shows off her traditional tattoos.

would sit and pierce each other, mostly to decorate our bodies.” Tattooing by the tikaniya, or gudhni (carving and designs expert) is a painful process. The natural black ink is obtained from the soot of a kerosene lamp and rubbed with cow dung to clean it afterward. After drying, mustard oil is applied to soften the skin surface.

“This tika is to look good. If we have tika on the forehead and some symbol on the chin, we look beautiful,” says Bismani Chaudhary, 76, from Bashgadhi Municipality-4, Bathuwatal. “Tattoos symbolize our purity and, in any ceremony, if you don’t have tattoos or piercings, then women are not allowed to cook food. At the time of big weddings, those who didn’t have tattoos were considered impure, thus they also got tattoos.”

In addition to their aesthetic value, Tharu women also get tattoos as a symbol of maturity. When a young girl reaches puberty, she is able to get tattooed. The designs relate to their sociocultural surroundings, God and deities, and other symbols. The tattoos carry their own significance for the tattooed person, signifying spirituality, fashion, memories, and personal style.

Tattoos are also a traditional practice of Newar Indigenous Peoples. They use different kinds of images on their bodies either temporarily or as permanent tattoos. The most frequent images they use are the half moon, animals, birds, plants, divine emblems, or deities. The images of gods and goddesses like Bhairab, Ganesh, and Shiva, as well as the tiki-jhya (latticed window), are used to decorate the upper parts of the body, and the animals, birds and plants are sketched on the lower limbs. The Newar believe that tattoos assure their protection in the present life, driving away misfortune, and are a treasure for the next life.

The Newar term for traditional tattooing is Lha-Chyogu (writing on the flesh). With the changing times, the beliefs and purposes of tattooing have also changed. Today, tattoos have become more of a fashion statement and a means of expression. Tamang, Gurung, Magar, and Sunuwar women also have tattooing practices with different purposes. They mostly adorn their chins, hands, or legs with symbols of animals, plants, or hearts. Tattoos are not only designs, but visual expressions of Indigenous cultures. Folktales, myths, and beliefs are reflected in tattoos and are part of the intangible cultural heritage of Indigenous Peoples.

Intergenerational knowledge transfer also occurs through the use this visual language

There is a prevalent belief among Tharu Peoples that on the way to heaven, if one faces hardships, they can sell their tattoos and make it to heaven more easily. Likewise, after death, jewelry can’t be taken to the afterlife, but the tattoos accompany the person. “When we die, we don’t get to take money or clothes. But this tattoo remains forever and goes with us,” says Kalpana Chaudhary, 53, from Bashgadhi, Municipality-4. “When we die, no one goes with us as a friend. At the time of cremation of our body, clothes, and jewels are removed and thrown away, and the only thing remaining on our skin are the tattoos and the memories that are attached to them. Moreover, if we have a tika, God will take us to heaven,” she says.

“My grandmother and my mother had tattoos and so do I. Now tattooing practice has almost gone extinct. I don’t see Tharu women piercing their bodies with tattoos, and younger generations have gone to cities and tattooed [themselves] with different symbols without any meaning. Nowadays, our girls don’t like our tattoos,” Chaudhary says. Because young girls are shying away from tattooing traditions, Tharu Elders are concerned about its continuity. In the past, tattooing was also common among Tharu men, usually on the neck, hands, and legs. But the younger generations no longer want to get tattoos as they are attracted to western cultures and see the tradition as outdated. It appears this decline is linked to the loss of Indigenous Traditional Knowledge and the younger generations are not aware of the cultural significance behind the traditional tattoos.

“My mother has only a small tattoo on her leg. In my village, we hardly saw grannies with tattoos. We were never told any stories related to tattoos, thus we were never attracted to tattoos,” says Urmila Gamwa Tharu (Tharu), a Tharu language television program producer from Kanchanpur and presenter known as Chali-Gochali at Indigenous Television. “But having visited other Tharu villages and after listening to stories about tattoo arts, now I am interested in getting some traditional tattoos.”

Anoj Tharu (Tharu) is a staff reporter at Indigenous Television in Nepal.

Left: Bismani Chaudhary (Tharu).

Right: Kalpana Chaudhary (Tharu).

STRENGTHENING BURYAT PRIDE THROUGH SHATAR

Maria Kuklina (BURYAT)

Marina Dagdanova (BURYAT)

Vera Kuklina (BURYAT)

Buryats are one of the most numerous Indigenous Peoples living around Lake Baikal in Siberia. Traditionally, they were nomadic cattle breeders and semi-nomadic herders with seasonal movements between permanent winter and summer settlements. Buryats in the Predbaikalia region, which is on the western side of Lake Baikal, have kept shamanism as their main spiritual practice, while Buryats in Transbaikalia, on the eastern side of Lake Baikal, adopted Buddhism in the 19th century. On both sides of the lake some Buryats practice a form of syncretism that combines elements of both traditions.

The western side of Baikal is the Irkutsk Oblast. According to WorldGEO, Indigenous Buryats constitute 3.3 percent, or approximately 80,000, of the total population of 2.4 million. Prior to 2008, the Ust-Orda Okrug (county) existed as an autonomous entity. In 2008, it was absorbed by the Irkutsk Oblast, a region now predominantly inhabited by Russians. Since then, it has retained only a few features of cultural autonomy. Representation of Indigenous Buryat people is extremely limited in public spaces.

One of the ways Buryat cultural autonomy and continuity is maintained is through the organization of cultural and sports festivals dedicated to the celebration of Sagaalgan, a Buryat holiday associated with the beginning of the New Year according to the lunar calendar, and Sur-Kharban, an ancient Buryat sports festival celebrated after spring field work. During Sagaalgan, there are national sports

competitions in wrestling, archery, shagai (a game that uses goat or sheep bones instead of dice), and shatar (Buryat chess). Sur-Kharban is an event that brings together all athletes living in the region. Some of its sporting events include soccer, volleyball, table tennis, checkers, chess, and Buryat national sports of horse racing, wrestling, archery, shatar, and shagai.

During Soviet times, the celebration of Sur-Kharban was more of a sporting than a cultural event. It did not include the important elements such as wearing traditional dress, performing traditional songs and dance, and the traditional sports included only wrestling and horse racing. Shatar and archery were introduced into the tournament competitions of Sur-Kharban in the early 2000s, and shagai was introduced about a decade later. In archery and shagai, participants are required to wear Buryat traditional clothing. There is no such requirement for shatar tournaments, but participants have been increasingly wearing traditional attire at the events. It is also becoming more popular to wear traditional clothing on Buryat holidays and at various other national sporting events. In recent years, there has been an increase in interest by youth in European chess; the number of participants in regional competitions has increased by 10 percent annually. However, among national sports, shatar currently occupies an undeservedly small place: there are no shatar clubs or classes in Irkutsk region. Shatar tournaments only occur within the annual celebration of Sur-Kharban and Altargana, a holiday that is celebrated biennially.

The Shatar 38 Project is seizing on this growth in popularity as an opportunity to teach young people to play shatar, as well as to attract new players to this sport. Funded

Left/Middle:  Participants proudly wear their Buryat clothing at a chess tournament in a datsan in Irkutsk, Russia.

Right: Youth attend a master class and a shatar tournament in Novonukutsk, Russia.

by the Keepers of the Earth Fund (KOEF), Shatar 38 aims to fill the existing cultural gap by promoting Buryat culture through the popularization of the Buryat game. To promote shatar as a tool for intercultural dialogue, Shatar 38 organizes regional tournaments and holds master classes on shatar in chess clubs in the city of Irkutsk during Sur-Khurban and at the Erdyn games. So far, about 500 people have directly participated in the project, and an additional 4,000 people will be informed about the project and shatar through social media, websites, and social networks.

Maria Kuklina, head coordinator of the Shatar 38 Project, works as a chess coach at the Irkutsk National Research Technical University where she has been promoting shatar since 2019. Every year, the University hosts open city championships in shatar where most of the participants have been Buryat students who attend the school. With support of a KOEF grant, Shatar 38 has expanded the reach of the game. So far in 2023, three tournaments and five master classes have been held in Irkutsk and the Nukut district. Project participants also plan to hold master classes in chess clubs in the region and organize a large regional shatar tournament in June. The master classes also serve as space to teach people about Buryat cultural connections to shatar, the history of the game, and how the sport fostered friendship between Peoples. In addition, Shatar 38 is developing a mobile application and is promoting the game on social media using a group created in the messaging app Viber.

The organizers of the shatar tournaments encourage participants to wear Buryat traditional clothing by offering a prize for the best traditional attire. Buryat traditional clothing shows the complex history of different eras and the influences of various cultures and tribes across southern Siberia and Central Asia. Traditional dress is an important marker of ethnic identification, and traditional Buryat clothing is characteristic of steppe nomadic herders. It uses sheepskin materials derived from cattle ranching and is distinguished by the cut of the upper garment, the presence of a sleeveless jacket, the finishing of the enger (a special decorative feature on men’s cloaks), and slipperlike shoes called gutals. Women traditionally covered their hair with a headdress and wore temporal and breastplate ornaments made of coral. The clothing of Predbaikalia Buryats differs from that of Transbaikalia Buryats in size, cut, material, character of sewing, and ornamentation.

Buryat communities in the territory of Predbaikalye consist of three main tribes: the Bulagat, Ekhirit, and Khongodor, who fuse their Tungus, Oirat and Turkic origins with Mongolian influence and traditions. Their traditional clothing also changed significantly under Russian influence; under Soviet and, later, Russian colonization and widespread globalization, traditional clothing has been replaced by a more urban style. However, with growing revival of Indigenous identity, traditional clothing is being reconstructed by museums and national centers for cultural heritage,

including those with State support, such as the Ust-Ordyn Center of Folk Art. Modern designers are also re-interpreting the theme of traditional Buryat clothing.

The revival of religious practices in post-Soviet Buryat communities is also expressed through clothing. Original shamanic practices are being revived, along with the reconstruction of local shamanic attire. Buddhist temples often serve as cultural centers, and people visit datsans (Buddhist monasteries) wearing traditional clothes. They shop in local stores in datsans that offer traditional clothes, art, crafts, and souvenirs. Fashion design competitions are taking place at different levels including the international Buryat Altargana festival, ethno-fashion contests at Torgon Zam, the international Ethnopodium festival, and many others in Ulan-Ude, Irkutsk, Ust-Orda, and Aginsk, the main centers of the Indigenous Buryat population. Additionally, in preschools and elementary schools, teachers are educating children about the history, appearance, features, and symbols of traditional Buryat clothing while teaching children how to make it. It is also becoming more popular to make souvenir dolls dressed in traditional clothing made by children, professional artists, and craftspeople as a way to showcase Buryat culture.

In shatar, the main principles of chess are preserved, but there are some minor differences. The pawn moves only one square forward; the knight has no right to checkmate; and the queen moves vertically and horizontally, but diagonally only to the adjacent square.

Contemporary Buryats have started to wear traditional dress when attending national and religious festivals and events such as Sagalgaan, Sur-Kharban, tribal taialgans (prayers), and family events such as weddings, anniversaries, and milanguud (children’s birthday parties). The use of modern and traditional Buryat clothing continues to increase the visibility of Buryat culture, proving that it is alive and resurging despite many years of colonization and assimilation.

In 2022, the Shatar 38 Project received a grant from the Keepers of the Earth Fund, an Indigenous-led fund at Cultural Survival designed to support Indigenous Peoples’ advocacy and community development projects globally. Since 2017, we have supported 293 projects in 40 countries through small grants and technical assistance, totaling  $1,496,864.

Maria Kuklina (Buryat) and Marina Dagdanova (Buryat) teach at Irkutsk National Research Technical University. Vera Kuklina (Buryat) works as a Research Professor at George Washington University. Together, they coordinate the Shatar 38 Project.

¡Chayamun uñanchick!: CLIVER CCAHUANIHANCCO ARQUE

CS Staff

Chayamun uñanchick! (Our little one has arrived!) were the words Cliver Ccahuanihancco Arque’s (Quechua) grandparents expressed when they found out about his birth. When Cliver came into the world, it not only meant love and celebration for the addition of one more member to his already large family, but also a future workforce to carry on the tradition of agriculture, livestock, and sheep wool collection, which was the foundation of his family’s livelihood. As a child, Cliver herded animals, chased away birds to protect seeds, and counted the number of bites each cow, alpaca, and sheep took to discover their connection with Pachamama. This eventually made him understand that both humans and other living beings coexist within and alongside Mother Earth. Cliver’s love for the land inspired him to pursue meaningful work, which led him to recently join the Cultural Survival family as a Program Assistant for the Keepers of the Earth Fund.

According to Cliver’s parents, “His childhood unfolded in a traditional way according to our Quechua culture, but later he had to move to an urban setting where the Indigenous culture we had passed on to him was not an option...the violence practiced against us was so cruel that it made us tell him not to be, or resemble, what we were—Indigenous—as he would risk being excluded and discriminated against as well.” Nevertheless, Cliver remained proud of his Quechua Indigenous identity, belonging to the Colla ethnic group within the Andean region of Peru.

In 2009, Cliver entered a private law school and also began studying anthropology at a public university. “It was like two different worlds; on one hand, an elite, private faculty filled with people my family called Mistis (white mestizos with power), and on the other hand, a lesser-known major that welcomed rural, campesino, and Indigenous people like me,” he says. This experience awakened him to the imbalance of power, and from there, he became interested in the promotion of human rights and the collective rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Cliver is also concerned about the struggles of Indigenous Peoples in terms of justice and health, having worked within the Peruvian Health System during the pandemic. He recalls the case of a patient diagnosed with COVID-19 admitted to the hospital where he worked. “His case was really serious and he was taken directly to the intensive care unit. The patient’s family were campesinos, but they pretended not to be. The first thing they said, in a very agitated tone, was, ‘We already know why nobody wants to bring their sick to the hospital!’ The family started speaking in Aymara, the ancestral language of their region, and between tears and anger, they told me their relative was very ill and that the doctors were not giving them much information. This called me more than ever as a servant and authority to help them since my position was the intercultural delegate.”

Cliver began researching the situation of this patient and others in similar situations, and he implemented strategies to bring patients and families closer together. Families wrote letters to their relatives, created drawings expressing their affection, and made videos giving them encouragement.

“I confess that I did this covertly, but the patients improved. This taught me a lesson: a community is not just a group of people, but an energy of people that forge, connect, and heal.” Although he faced reprimands for these actions and had to resign from his position, he believes he acted for the well being of those who needed it.

Now, in a much different work environment, Cliver says, “I’m thrilled to be part of an organization whose conviction is real and not speculative, and whose work can be proven. In Cultural Survival, Indigenous people work and do a lot for other Indigenous people without resorting to paternalism. By joining this team, I’m adding strengths to our shared goal of seeking honor and respect for Indigenous and Native Peoples worldwide and making the world a better place. I hope to stay and grow within Cultural Survival as it fulfills not only my professional expectations, but also my expectations for life and actions for our Peoples.”

Far Left: Victoria Graciela Arque Aguilar, Cliver’s mother, with him during a visit to the floating islands of Uros in Puno, Peru. Left: Cliver with Latin American thinkers at the International Congress of Latin American Philosophy held in Cuba, where he presented a paper on Andean Philosophy.

Roots of Tradition in SOUTH SUDAN

Africa’s Women’s Day is celebrated annually on July 31 to recognize and affirm the role of women in Africa and to spotlight the fight to improve their social and economic status. At Cultural Survival, we want to elevate and support African and Indigenous African women from their own spaces. One of our objectives is to promote Bazaar artists who, through their creations, steward and further the cultures of Indigenous Peoples while contributing to their communities’ economies.

Anyieth D’Awol runs Roots of South Sudan, a project that aims to provide a secure environment for women to pursue economic independence through traditional crafts. D’Awol studied law and human rights in the United Kingdom and has worked as an independent researcher. She has also written on women’s rights, contributing a chapter on sexual violence in “Hope, Pain and Patience: The Women of South Sudan.”

From 2006 to 2009, D’Awol was a Human Rights Officer for the United Nations Mission in Sudan. Through this experience, she envisioned an organization committed to the economic empowerment of South Sudanese women and communities through the promotion of tradition-based arts and crafts, which would eventually take shape as Roots of South Sudan.

D’Awol endeavored to create a center where women from different Tribes would come together to work under one roof and exchange ideas and techniques. In 2009, she founded the Roots project. Today, as many as 60 women are members of the center, including members from the Dinka, Nuer, Shilluk, Mundari, and Toposa Tribes. They receive the materials for the crafts, and once the product is done, Roots of South Sudan promotes and markets the finished products locally and abroad. Each member’s income supports about six to 10 family members.

Roots of South Sudan also provides literacy and math classes, childcare, healthy

meals for the women members and their children, as well as transportation, legal support, and emergency funding for healthcare as needed. During the pandemic, Roots provided food packets to the women to limit their exposure to the local food markets. The women feel thankful not just for the income but also for the experiences with other women: “When I enrolled in ornaments making, we received training, we learned very well. I am grateful to people who buy my crafts,” said Anna Ugut, an ornamental artisan. “The work has given me the opportunity to gain happiness. I [interact] with my fellow Tribal women. The earning I receive from the beadwork helps me provide my children with what they like,” said Martha Nyakuma, a widowed mother of four.

Sara Jok, a 53-year-old widowed mother of six, commented, “The first day was difficult; I didn’t interact with the women. But as we continued with work, I learned a lot from the group besides beadwork. We call ourselves one family.” Another member, Akwar, 54, from the Anyuak Tribe, added, “The project has brought me joy and peace. I used to stay home and think about my family; I had no friends to talk to. I gained friendship, and most importantly, the project [was therapeutic]” she says. Akwar has been separated from her family since the beginning of Sudan’s civil war in 2013.

The women of the Roots project bring unique styles and traditions of their Tribes and learn new techniques from each other. Working side by side, sharing with their children and their lives, the women form personal relationships crossing tribal boundaries. They provide social and emotional support to each other and are mutually invested in the project’s success. As D’Awol says, “The cycles of violence, poverty, and insecurity can be broken by the empowerment of women who will provide the right conditions for children and their future.”

Top: Anyieth D’Awol, Roots of South Sudan founder.

Middle: The intricate process of beading.

Bottom: Women artists working with Roots of South Sudan.

Purchase items made by Roots members: Rootsofsouthsudan.org and roots-jewelry. myshopify.com

The Cultural Survival Bazaars Are Back! December 14-17, 2023

The Prudential Center, Boston, MA bazaar.cs.org

Photos courtesy of Roots of South Sudan.

Since 1975, Cultural Survival Bazaars have partnered with Indigenous artists to share their heritages and market their products in the New England region. Our family-friendly Bazaars, featuring food and live music, are also opportunities for the community to engage with one another and learn about Indigenous art, cultures, and issues affecting their communities.

We are excited to announce that after the long hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Cultural Survival Bazaars are back and we invite you to join us in celebrating Indigenous artists and craftspeople this winter season.

For more information visit: bazaar.cs.org