Indigenous Research Of Land Self And Spirit

Indigenous cultures meticulously protect and preserve their traditions. Those traditions often have deep connections to the homelands of indigenous peoples, thus forming strong relationships between culture, land, and communities. Autoethnography can help shed light on the nature and complexity of these relationships. Indigenous Research of Land, Self, and Spirit is a collection of innovative research that focuses on the ties between indigenous cultures and the constructs of land as self and agency. It also covers critical intersectional, feminist, and heuristic inquiries across a variety of indigenous peoples. Highlighting a broad range of topics including environmental studies, land rights, and storytelling, this book is ideally designed for policymakers, academicians, students, and researchers in the fields of sociology, diversity, anthropology, environmentalism, and history.

Written originally in Oriya in 1945 and translated here for the first time, Paraja is a classic of modern Indian fiction. It tells on an epic scale the story of a tribal patriarch and his family in the mountainous jungles of Orissa. The slow decline in the fortunes of this family - from the quiet prosperity of a subsistence livelihood towards bondage to the local moneylender - is both poignantly individualized as well as symbolic of the erosion of a whole way of life within peasant communities. The novel, furthermore, transcends what it documents because its characters are not merely primitive tribesmen ensnared by a predatory moneylender. Mohanty's protagonists are also quintessentially men and women waging heroic but futile war against a hostile universe. As the citation of the Jnanpith Award of 1974 put it - 'in Mohanty's hands the social is lifted to the level of the metaphysical.'

The first book on Indigenous quantitative methodologies, this concise, accessible text opens up a major new approach for research across the disciplines and applied fields.

A paradigm-shifting book in the vein of Sapiens that brings a crucial Indigenous perspective to historical and cultural issues of history, education, money, power, and sustainability—and offers a new template for living. As an indigenous person, Tyson Yunkaporta looks at global systems from a unique perspective, one tied to the natural and spiritual world. In considering how contemporary life diverges from the pattern of creation, he raises important questions. How does this affect us? How can we do things differently? In this thoughtful, culturally rich, mind-expanding book, he provides answers. Yunkaporta’s writing process begins with images. Honoring indigenous traditions, he makes carvings of what he wants to say, channeling his thoughts through symbols and diagrams rather than words. He yarns with people, looking for ways to connect images and stories with place and relationship to create a coherent world view, and he uses sand talk, the Aboriginal custom of drawing images on the ground to convey knowledge. In Sand Talk, he provides a new model for our everyday lives. Rich in ideas and inspiration, it explains how lines and symbols and shapes can help us make sense of the world. It’s about how we learn and how we remember. It’s about talking to everyone and listening carefully. It’s about finding different ways to look at things. Most of all it’s about a very special way of thinking, of learning to see from a native perspective, one that is spiritually and physically tied to the earth around us, and how it can save our world. Sand Talk include 22 black-and-white illustrations that add depth to the text.

This book accurately depicts Native American approaches to land and spirituality through an interdisciplinary examination of Indian philosophy, history, and literature. Indian approaches to land and spirituality are neither simple nor monolithic, making them hard to grasp for outsiders. A fuller, more accurate understanding of these concepts enables comprehension of the unique ways land and spirit have interlinked Native American communities across centuries of civilization, and reveals insights about our current pressing environmental concerns and American history. In Land and Spirit in Native America, author Joy Porter argues that American colonization has been a determining factor in how we perceive Indian spirituality and Indian relationships to nature. Having an appreciation for these traditional values regarding ritual, memory, time, kinship, and the essential reciprocity between all things allows us to rethink aspects of history and culture. This understanding also makes Indian film, philosophy, literature, and art accessible.

This book accurately depicts Native American approaches to land and spirituality through an interdisciplinary examination of Indian philosophy, history, and literature. Indian approaches to land and spirituality are neither simple nor monolithic, making them hard to grasp for outsiders. A fuller, more accurate understanding of these concepts enables comprehension of the unique ways land and spirit have interlinked Native American communities across centuries of civilization, and reveals insights about our current pressing environmental concerns and American history. In Land and Spirit in Native America, author Joy Porter argues that American colonization has been a determining factor in how we perceive Indian spirituality and Indian relationships to nature. Having an appreciation for these traditional values regarding ritual, memory, time, kinship, and the essential reciprocity between all things allows us to rethink aspects of history and culture. This understanding also makes Indian film, philosophy, literature, and art accessible.

A “profound and inspiring” collection of ancient indigenous wisdom for “anyone wanting the healing of self, society, and of our shared planet” (Peter Levine, author of Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma). A Penobscot Indian draws on the experiences and wisdom of the First Nations to address environmental justice, water protection, generational trauma, and more. Drawing from ancestral knowledge, as well as her experience as an attorney and activist, Sherri Mitchell addresses some of the most crucial issues of our day—including indigenous land rights, environmental justice, and our collective human survival. Sharing the gifts she has received from the elders of her tribe, the Penobscot Nation, she asks us to look deeply into the illusions we have labeled as truth and which separate us from our higher mind and from one another. Sacred Instructions explains how our traditional stories set the framework for our belief systems and urges us to decolonize our language and our stories. It reveals how the removal of women from our stories has impacted our thinking and disrupted the natural balance within our communities. For all those who seek to create change, this book lays out an ancient world view and set of cultural values that provide a way of life that is balanced and humane, that can heal Mother Earth, and that will preserve our communities for future generations.

A powerful story of spiritual awakening, reconnection with Nature, and rekindling of ancestral wisdom • Details the author’s encounters with ancestral spirits and animal teachers, such as Coy-Wolf, and profound moments of direct connection with the natural world • Shows how ancestral connections and intimate communications with Nature are not unique or restricted to those with indigenous cultural roots • Reveals how reconnection with ancestors and the natural world offers insight and solutions for the complex problems we face We are but a few generations removed from millennia spent living in intimate contact with the natural world and in close commune with ancestral spirits. Who we are and who we think we are is rooted in historical connections with those who came before us and in our relationships with the land and the sentient natural world. When we wander too far from our roots, our ancestors and kin in the natural world call us home, sometimes with gentle whispers and sometimes in loud voices sounding alarms. In this powerful story of spiritual awakening, Randy Kritkausky shares his journey into the realm of ancestral Native American connections and intimate encounters with Mother Earth and shows how anyone can spiritually reconnect with their ancestors and Nature. Like 70 percent of those who identify as Native American, Kritkausky grew up off the reservation. As he explains, for such “off reservation” indigenous people rediscovering ancestral practices amounts to a reawakening and offers significant insights about living in a society that is struggling to mend a heavily damaged planet. The author reveals how the awakening process was triggered by his own self-­questioning and the resumption of ties with his Potawatomi ancestors. He details his encounters with ancestral spirits and animal teachers, such as Coy-Wolf. He shares moments of direct connection with the natural world, moments when the consciousness of other living beings, flora and fauna, became accessible and open to communication. Through his profound storytelling, Kritkausky shows how ancestral connections and intimate communications with Nature are not unique or restricted to those with indigenous cultural roots. Offering a bridge between cultures, a path that can be followed by Native and non-Native alike, the author shows that spiritual awakening can happen anywhere, for anyone, and can open the gateway to deeper understanding.

Much previous literature on sacred natural sites has been written from a non-indigenous perspective. In contrast, this book facilitates a greater self-expression of indigenous perspectives regarding treatment of the sacred and its protection and governance in the face of threats from various forms of natural resource exploitation and development. It provides indigenous custodians the opportunity to explain how they view and treat the sacred through a written account that is available to a global audience. It thus illuminates similarities and differences of both definitions, interpretations and governance approaches regarding sacred natural phenomena and their conservation. The volume presents an international range of case studies, from the recent controversy of pipeline construction at Standing Rock, a sacred site for the Sioux people spanning North and South Dakota, to others located in Australia, Canada, East Timor, Hawaii, India, Mexico, Myanmar, Nigeria and the Philippines. Each chapter includes an analytical introduction and conclusion written by the editors to identify common themes, unique insights and key messages. The book is therefore a valuable teaching resource for students of indigenous studies, anthropology, religion, heritage, human rights and law, nature conservation and environmental protection. It will also be of great interest to professionals and NGOs concerned with nature and heritage conservation.

Indigenous, Modern and Postcolonial Relations to Nature contributes to the young field of intercultural philosophy by introducing the perspective of critical and postcolonial thinkers who have focused on systematic racism, power relations and the intersection of cultural identity and political struggle. Angela Roothaan discusses how initiatives to tackle environmental problems cross-nationally are often challenged by economic growth processes in postcolonial nations and further complicated by fights for land rights and self-determination of indigenous peoples. For these peoples, survival requires countering the scramble for resources and clashing with environmental organizations that aim to bring their lands under their own control. The author explores the epistemological and ontological clashes behind these problems. This volume brings more awareness of what structurally obstructs open exchange in philosophy world-wide, and shows that with respect to nature, we should first negotiate what the environment is to us humans, beyond cultural differences. It demonstrates how a globalizing philosophical discourse can fully include epistemological claims of spirit ontologies, while critically investigating the exclusive claim to knowledge of modern science and philosophy. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of environmental philosophy, cultural anthropology, intercultural philosophy and postcolonial and critical theory.