Unpacking the Landback Movement
with Lori Pourier, Gaby Strong, Tina Kuckkhan, and Quita Sullivan
Recorded April 6, 2023
At the 2021 GIA Annual Conference, several of our colleagues from NDN Collective, New England Foundation for the Arts, and First People’s Fund, hosted a roundtable session entitled Beyond the Land Acknowledgement. And then in 2022 Grantmakers in the Arts conference, GIA and several of our colleagues from NDN Collective, New England Foundation for the Arts, and First People’s Fund, hosted a roundtable session entitled From Land Acknowledgement to Landback. The conversation is centered around the collective shift to acknowledge sacred land at public events, and powerful and progressive that has been. The session also included a much-needed discussion around reparations and the various contexts surrounding it, justice, returning to the relationship with land we call home, how funders can get involved, and more.
We are glad to have the insights of special guests Tina Kuckkahn, associate director, NDN Foundation, NDN Collective; Lori Pourier, president and CEO, First People’s Fund; Gaby Strong, managing director, NDN Foundation, NDN Collective; and Quita Sullivan, program director, Theater, New England Foundation for the Arts.
To listen to the full episode, click here.
Sherylynn Sealy:
Welcome to a podcast by Grantmakers in the Arts, a national membership association of public and private arts and culture funders. I'm Sherylynn Sealy, GIA's senior program manager.
At the 2022 Grantmakers in the Arts Conference, GIA and several of our colleagues from NDN Collective, New England Foundation for the Arts, and First Peoples Fund hosted a roundtable session entitled From Land Acknowledgement to Land Back. The conversation centered around the collective shifts to acknowledge sacred land at public events and how powerful and progressive that has been. But the session also included a much-needed discussion around reparations, justice, and returning to the relationship that we have with our land that we call home.
We are glad to continue this conversation today with special guests Tina Kuckkahn, NDN Foundation Associate Director at NDN Collective; Lori Pourier, president and CEO of First Peoples Fund; Gaby Strong, NDN Foundation managing director, NDN Collective; and Quita Sullivan, program director for theater at New England Foundation for the Arts.
Welcome everyone, and thank you so much for joining us. Before we begin, let's take a moment to have some introductions so those who are listening know who we're talking to, and we can start off with you, Tina.
Tina Kuckkahn:
Thank you. [Ojibwe Language]. Greetings, relatives. My name is Tina Kuckkahn. I use she/her pronouns. I'm the associate director for the NDN Collective Foundation, and I'm a citizen of the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Ojibwe.
Sherylynn Sealy:
Great. Thank you, Tina. All right, Lori.
Lori Pourier:
[Lakota Language]. Lori Pourier, Oglala Lakota, citizen of the Oglala Lakota Nation here in the beautiful Black Hills in southwestern South Dakota. I'm the president, CEO of First Peoples Fund.
Sherylynn Sealy:
Fantastic. Thank you, Lori. Gaby?
Gaby Strong:
[Dakotah Language]. Good morning, relatives. Good to be here. My name is Gaby Strong. I'm Sisseton-Wahpeton/Mdewakanton Dakota. I'm Zooming in here from our Dakota Homelands in Mni Sota Makoce, also known as Minnesota, Southwest Minnesota, and I'm the managing director of the NDN Foundation.
Sherylynn Sealy:
All right, great. Thank you, Gaby. And Quita.
Quita Sullivan:
[Native Language]. Senior Program Director of Theater, New England Foundation for the Arts [Native Language]. Good morning, friends, sisters. It's good to see you. My name is Quita Sullivan. In my language, I'm also known as Napishtawil, Soaring Waters, Turtle and Whale Clans. I'm Montaukett and Shinnecock, living here currently on the lands of my kin, the Massachusetts Nipmuck and Wampanoag folk. I'm the senior program director for theater at New England Foundation for the Arts. I use nákum/they/she pronouns.
Sherylynn Sealy:
All right. Fantastic. Thank you all for those introductions. I'm so excited to get into this conversation with you all.
It's become so much more popular, as we know, that's why we're here today, for folks to give land acknowledgements at the beginning of their events or when they're having meetings and that sort of thing. But folks are not having as many conversations about land back or talking about reparations and justice and what it means to kind of reclaim what belongs to you. So, can you just talk a little bit about what the Land Back movement is? I'll actually start with you, Gaby, on that question.
Gaby Strong:
Yeah. I think the origins of the Land Back movement began shortly after 1492. It does date back to that because land theft began at that time, and the continuous struggle and the thread of resistance and reclamation began at that time, too, with Indigenous people protecting and defending their homelands, our homelands upon which we all live today.
So, when we think about land acknowledgements that are the current fad and politically correct thing to do in this moment, there's benefit to that, but there's also a superficiality and shallowness to that because it really is a land theft acknowledgement that is necessary with an action plan attached to it. If there's an acknowledgement of anything, as well acknowledge the Earth upon which we all rely upon, do an Earth acknowledgement as well.
But when it comes to land, it is really a land theft acknowledgement that is necessary, and with a path forward to recognizing and putting into action, how do those things actually occur? When we hear the Land Back movement today, it doesn't belong to anybody or any one organization or one leader or leadership; it is something that is an ideal, an ideology, a goal, a vision, a mission on the part of many today. This newer generation, this younger generation has really embraced that. It's looked like and been called many different things over hundreds of years. But today, this is how it manifests, as a Land Back movement where our people and our younger people are seeking to reclaim lands that were stolen and belong to our tribal people.
Sherylynn Sealy:
That's great. Thank you, Gaby. Tina, or anyone, would you like to add on?
Tina Kuckkahn:
Yes. Thank you so much, Gaby, for that foundation that you've provided. Just to add to it, that what we're really talking about is relationship, relationship to the land, to our mother, which we see as a living entity that we are only a small part of. As our people have struggled since contact to retain the land that we don't see as having owned by anybody... Just the way we think about land and water and the universe through our languages, the utilization of animate and inanimate terms, actually acknowledging the life-giving force of our land, we just see this intricate relationship. And so the concept of ownership is so foreign, and how arrogant to imagine that anyone could own a river or a mountain. So, we're already coming at it from a different perspective.
What we're thinking about is the stewardship of the land and what that can look like today and the vast amounts of public lands that are currently overseen by our federal government, understanding that if you look to Indigenous ways of being with the land and stewarding the land, this is such an urgent time right now. We all need to be thinking about reclaiming some of those principles of how do we live with the land for the benefit of all people in the planet. It's such a big picture and compelling issue. It's not just a current hot topic. Our people have always been fighting for the land, and the Land Back movement today is providing an incredible platform for today's generations of leaders, who are standing on the shoulders of our ancestors, to keep moving forward. We just recognize, too, that intimate relationship with the land includes our Black relatives and other folks who have migrated here, who work the land, people who've been oppressed. So, this movement is bigger picture and it includes everyone.
Sherylynn Sealy:
I love that. Thank you for that contribution, Tina.
Quita Sullivan:
Yeah. I was just going to say that there are a couple of things that came up listening to both Gaby and Tina. One is that I've been struggling with this term land acknowledgement for a while now because it feels like it's cutting out the people who are still there and who are still struggling to retain their rights to their homelands as well as to getting them back. I mean physically getting them back. I've been trying to find new terminology besides land acknowledgement because it's not a land acknowledgement. As Gaby said, it is a land theft acknowledgement. You stole this. Therefore, we're acknowledging the people that we stole it from, but we're not acknowledging our relationship to the ongoing folks who are there or to that actual theft.
Then the other thing, I just was in this conversation yesterday with one of my team members about stuff that we're doing and how reparations has been so racialized in this country so that people think it's only about slavery. But it wouldn't have been necessary to have that slavery without the other need for reparations, which is what land back is about. So, I'm glad to hear... Actually, this space is probably the only other space besides internally to my team where we have that kind of conversation. I'm appreciative of the fact that we can have that conversation here because the racialization of reparations and land back has become a way of dividing us. I see that when I'm outside of my own community.
Sherylynn Sealy:
Thanks for that, Quita. That was super deep, and that's something that I hadn't thought about, so thank you for that.
Lori Pourier:
Yeah. If I could just add on to that and really lifting up what Gaby said about really it began in 1492 with land theft. I also think about just place in terms of where I'm fortunate to sit today and the beautiful He Sapa, the Black Hills, and just seeing Gaby was talking about the younger movement and the younger folks and then the elders coming together, those that really stood up for the rights, our sovereignty and the American Indian Movement and some of the folks back in the '70s, to see those that continued to pray, those that continued to practice ceremony prior to the Indian Religious Freedom Act and held on to those practices and way of life.
So, I feel really good about sitting in a place of where my ancestors moved and lived around the beautiful Black Hills and learning more about our creation stories and Lakota star knowledge. You see just this beautiful movement of folks really wanting to learn their relationship to land, place, earth, sky, mother; and that our ceremonies, they never disappeared because someone, one individual, two individuals, three individuals, four individuals and communities continue to retain those and carry those in often sometimes tough conditions.
I just wanted to add that and really lift up because in terms of this, where I live here, also, in Oceti Sakowin territory, and ours began really with the discover of gold in this area and just forced removal. I'm also living up near one of, I think it's the second mine up there in Lee Deadwood, South Dakota. It's next to the largest mine, which is in Mexico. Thinking about just that destruction of land over time and just the destruction of Buci Macaw and Grandmother Earth and just all of those things that happened to us in this territory, in this region, yet our people continue to practice those ways.
I think if I would acknowledge and recognize and build off of what my sister said and shared here, and especially the good work of NDN Collective and Gaby and folks there, is that I think it's just really important that it always, always acknowledges the inherent right of tribes and their peoples and the nations and those knowledge-keepers, those tradition-keepers, those culture-bearers to continue to rightfully gather their medicines, their foods, their fish, all of those things that make us unique to our tribes, our region and our territory.
That's been taken away from many of our culture-bearers. I think about Bud Lane, who's the vice chair of the Siletz Tribe, who's one of our Community Spirit Award honorees, who tells the story of the elder weaver that taught him and how she wove through three wars, and that was even through termination of their tribe and how she taught him. It just took one individual practicing their inherent sovereign rights. She continued to weave and practice their ways of being in their own territories regardless of all of the things that were going on around them. It takes that one individual or those individuals to really uplift the rest of us, and so just want to acknowledge that. Thank you. [inaudible 00:15:46]
Sherylynn Sealy:
Yeah. Yeah. Of course. Thanks for that, Lori. Please, please.
Gaby Strong:
Yeah. Lori, thank you for that. I just wanted to really point out that the Land Back Movement is not just a political movement; it's not just a political framework or a campaign. There's a spiritual foundation and root to this, an origin to it because it really reflects our inherent relationship to the land as Indigenous people. I think Tina spoke to that as well. That's the foundation of everything for us. That is the root of who we are as Indigenous people: belonging to the land, not the land belonging to us, but we belonging to the land, to our mother. That is the foundation of everything that we do. It's that spiritual intention; it's that spiritual power. We acknowledge the different dimensions of power. Spiritual power is one of them. Many social movements that have seen the results are based on that spiritual power. So, just really wanted to recognize that, that aspect of who we are and what sustains us today.
Quita Sullivan:
This is Quita. I just want to add that for many of us, and certainly for me, Shinnecock, being able to name Shinnecock is about the place-where-the-rocks-are-at-the-water. That's my relationship to my nation. That is my relationship to who I am. Every time I speak that name, I'm talking about a place, a place where my family is and has always been despite some of the earliest colonization in this country. So, it's really important that those traditions are being maintained.
When I think about alternate forms of Land Back Movement, because not everybody can get land back, but language reclamation is a land back. It's about bringing our language back and restoring our right relationship with those places, where we are are from, where our people are from. The fact that all of us this morning introduced ourselves in our language is, for me, a triumphant thing because that was one of those things that was used to alienate us from our spaces and from our cultures. Land back is a very complicated and a very joyous process most of the time.
Sherylynn Sealy:
Thanks for that acknowledgement, Quita.
Quita, as we transition to our next question, you brought up a really important topic as it relates to reparations and how the word reparations already has been weaponized and is always connected to slavery in the United States. Somehow, for lots of people, it doesn't go beyond that. But we of course know that that's just not true. So, when we consider reparations to Indigenous or Native American communities, what can that look like? We talked about land specifically. Are there any particular projects? Or if you want to offer some examples more broadly for folks who are not working at a particular organization that focuses on Indigenous or Native American communities.
Quita Sullivan:
Thank you, Sherylynn. I do want to say that I'm an Indigenous woman working at a non-Indigenous foundation or nonprofit organization, and we don't own land, so we're not going to give land back. But there are other ways that we can actually participate in those efforts. I'm going to give a shout-out to one of my team members, Leilani Ricardo, who is spearheading this for us as a normal part of how we operate.
We are in the process of holding a meeting in Kansas City. Part of our values, part of our ethos is about giving back, is that land back mentality. She went in and she is connecting with folks there. She's also looking for opportunities where we can actually donate dollars to land back efforts as part of our programmatic work. It is not separate from anything that we do. It is important that everything we do be responsible to my relatives in that area, and it is part of our team ethos.
There are any number of ways that non-Native organizations who say, "Well, I can't give land back. I'm not a landowner." There are many ways. There are many things. There are language reclamation efforts all over this country. If you are holding a meeting somewhere, if you are sitting somewhere, it is a responsibility for you to find those places and build relationships with those people who are doing this work so that you can find responsible ways.
I think one of the things that I am most frustrated with are people who give without consideration of where that is going. I have given this example before, but at one point, the Montauketts were offered land, actual land back, but it had been used by an arms and airplane manufacturer. So, they wanted to give us the land back without the resources to do the toxic cleanup. That's land back in one sense, but it is not really land back. It is not responsible giving, and it was impossible. We're small, non-federally recognized, and we have no resources to clean that place up. So we had to say, "Thank you, but no; we'd rather have money."
Sherylynn Sealy:
Mm-hmm. Yep.
Gaby Strong:
This is Gaby. Thank you for that. It makes me think about when we're talking about reparations and for the Land Back Movement, it isn't, as we've said, not just a literal rematriation of land. It is broader than that. We've shared some of that already, of what that means. But in the context of this conversation for institutional philanthropy and the funding arena, it also means the dismantling of systems that made land theft possible in the first place. When we think about reparations as a framework, we almost learn the UN framework, the United Nations framework of reparations. There are conditions for that.
One of them, quite simply, is stop doing what you're already doing. Change it up, switch it up. It really calls on this institution of philanthropy, which has really been an extension of colonization and still is because funders are out there putting their own strategies on community, putting their own priorities on community. In order to receive funding, we really would like you to align with these things that we care about and are important to our vision and to our mission as a funder, as a funder who has never lived in that place, knows very little about it or the people. That's colonization, and that's funding and fueling colonization.
So, in the context of institutional philanthropy, that's how you can switch that up: Fund, support, community, not just community-based organizations because there's a lot of storefronts out there. Just say that. Or fronts at the door. Community-led organizations, and even better, turn your assets over to Indigenous hands, turn those assets over. That's part of reparations.
Lori Pourier:
This is Lori. I'd just like to add on to Gaby because we have had many conversations over the years just in relationship to philanthropy and also even family foundations now that are really trying to shift and make changes. But I find myself so often in these conversations, and they're willing to think about different ways of distributing their wealth, but they're not really fully thinking about letting go of their power. So, there still is that, "Yes, I want to do this land land acknowledgement, all of that. I want to give all my wealth away, et cetera, et cetera." And then yet, they still hold the power.
I think just to lift up our founder at First Peoples Fund, Jennifer Easton. I remember when I first met her 23 years ago now. She was probably one of just a handful of individual donors that was giving all of her wealth to Indian Country. She said people used to ask her, "Why doesn't she do other things?" She was supporting buffalo restoration in this territory, doing some work with Vine Deloria, Jr. and others, and really supporting protection of timber rights on the Northwest Coast and just doing some good work. By the time I met her, she said, folks would really tell her, "Why do you give this money here only?" And she said, "Because if I give it, put it somewhere else, who's going to fill that gap?" She really saw that responsibility or accountability.
I think there's not very many people like that. There's not very many people that are willing to give up that power, and that's how we shifted, just to become our own 501C3 here at First Peoples Fund in 2003. It was originally a fund of Tides Foundation, trying to do microlending all the way from the Bay Area in my tribal community as one example. Like Gaby said, not being from there or ever have ever gone there and trying to do business from far away.
Sherylynn Sealy:
Yeah. Thanks for that, Lori. So...
Gaby Strong:
... Gaby. I just want to add maybe one more thing. In the context of institutional philanthropy and as arts funders who are supporting our creatives and our culture-bearers and the artistic expression of our people, many of whom rely on the land itself as the material and the resources in order for them to do that, we've talked about our artists, creatives, and cultural-bearers being on the front line of climate change, on the front lines of environmental movements. I share that because if there's the interconnectedness of all of that, it isn't just the art and for art's sake, but the interconnectedness of all of that, and it pertains to land; it pertains to the sustainability of our environment. It pertains to climate change that we are all facing and is a crisis for us as a human species. There is connection to all of that no matter where you stand in this funding arena.
When I think about land specifically, though, and those that are funding efforts that really connect to conservation, for example, there are huge conservation funds and funders of conservation efforts, many of which actually alienate the original people and the original stewards from those lands in the name of conservation. That's another thing, a way to switch it up when we think in terms of reparations and land back. Work with Indigenous people. Work with the original stewards of those lands because conservation efforts to date has worked in opposition to that. So, that is another tangible way to change it up within this philanthropic arena. Just wanted to name that as well.
Sherylynn Sealy:
That's great.
Lori Pourier:
Yeah. This is Lori. If I could just add to that, too, Gaby, is that even in some of these social impact investment conversations, and I'm hearing folks talking about or working on climate change, now I hear them using examples of the controlled burns and the right for tribes and tribal members to be able to do that. I'm thinking, "Where were those folks when the state offices passed those laws where the weavers could no longer gather their medicines, or could no longer do their own family controlled burns in their community?" Now the land's all out of whack, and they're just now saying, "Well, did you know..." Or, this is what's happening. But where were they when the states were making all of these forestry departments and stuff, making all of these decisions, and where are they now? Why aren't these our Community Spirit Award honorees? Why are they not at the table?
I sit on an family foundation board, and we brought in Bud Lane laying from the Siletz Tribe because they're sitting on timber over there in the Northwest Coast, and just to have him really come in and talk about that's their original territories and their original homelands, and they were pushed out because of timber, and then some family foundations own timber. So it's like, just give it back. We're bringing those folks into the room, in these conversations as we're talking about this thing called DEI. What is it? Diversity, equity, and inclusion?
Sherylynn Sealy:
Yeah. Yeah.
Lori Pourier:
It's like, oh, my God. Okay. Sorry.
Quita Sullivan:
This is Quita. Lori, as soon as everybody says DEI, I always think D-I-E.
Lori Pourier:
Oh!
Quita Sullivan:
Which is what those things tend to happen with all of those efforts within organizations. So, yeah.
Gaby Strong:
That's great, Quita.
Sherylynn Sealy:
It's kind of...
Gaby Strong:
That's great. One step away from the BIA, maybe.
Lori Pourier:
She's talking about the Bureau of Indian Affairs. I would like to add just one resource for folks to check out, too, and Gaby was talking all the way to the United Nations and the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. All this other things happening and Indigenous peoples around the world are having the same conversations and saying the same things they've been saying for 50, 60, 70 years now.
But we have this body of tribal leaders and tribal memberships called the National Congress of American Indians, and I think it was around 2019 when they had their general assembly in, I think, it was Albuquerque, but they came out with a statement or a reparation legislation that really addresses directly the impact and mistreatment of American Indians and Alaska Natives. I can send you that link because it's a statement to... I guess you would... yeah, a legislation to Congress to address the mistreatment of Indigenous peoples and Native peoples and tribal nations in our territories, in our regions. But I think it's a good thing for foundations and philanthropy and grantmakers to really understand what does it mean to be a sovereign within a sovereign in this country and the tribe's right to control their territories and such. So, I think that's a really great resource to checkout.
Sherylynn Sealy:
Yeah. That sounds great.
Quita Sullivan:
Yeah. I was going to say, for all those folks participating in D-I-E, E-D-I-A, all of those who are participating in all of those activities, to go back to the very beginning statement of a budget is a moral document. If you're not including lines for reparations for Native, Black folks, then your budget is... I'm going to say blankly. Your budget's lacking some morals. That is why, for us, it's a part of our convening budget. It absolutely is important because we believe as a theater team that it is important. It is part of our moral duty; it is part of our budget. We just put it there.
I think everyone who is participating in those kinds of efforts needs to look at what is that budget? Where are you living up to the values that you say you are espousing when you create those committees, when you create those working groups, when you create those task force or departments or hire folks to institute this at your institution, whether you are a foundation or any other organization, what part of your budget is going towards reparations for Native and Black folk?
Sherylynn Sealy:
Thanks for that.
Tina Kuckkahn:
This is Tina. I just want to emphasize a couple of points. One is that when we're talking about Indigenous peoples and the relationship, we should really be thinking in terms of recognition of the government entities. We're talking about tribal nations, and just the incredible diversity among our tribal nations across Turtle Island, also known as North America, that the one-size-fits-all model wouldn't work. Because of the federal policy periods, each time it seemed a new federal policy period was introduced, the end result was loss of more tribal lands.
With that backdrop, just wanting to encourage folks who are funders or who have opportunity to make changes in policy, just to recognize that long history and to understand that it takes a lot of time to build trust, and that, again, it comes back to the forming and building and strengthening of relationships, which are really key because each policy period that came into being, the Homestead Act, 1862, 270 million acres gone. Then about 20 years later, here comes the Dawes Act, which breaks up the reservations into allotments, another 90 million acres gone. There's good reason why that trust is not there and has to be built carefully and with recognition that we do represent distinctive cultures. We have our tribal languages, our own types of ceremonies, and that even within that landscape, it's complicated, as Quita has indicated. Some of the tribal nations are not federally recognized, and there are implications from that. There are state-recognized tribes.
Although it is a complicated landscape, I think it's still worth having conversations and building those relationships. Why? In part because I think... I just go back to our prophecies. The reason why we invest at NDN Collective into our artists is because we see them as those creative people. They have that energy to imagine a new and better world. So, we're going to invest in them because one of our prophecies is that we are at this crossroads right now. You cannot unlink land back from climate change. We have decisions to make as humanity. We can continue going down that path of destruction, or we can make another change and learn to live within natural law. If we don't do that, then we're all imperiled. That's why this work, this collective movement-building work that we're all engaged in around this table is so critically important. We have big decisions to make, and more importantly, we have big action to take at this time.
Sherylynn Sealy:
That's right. Thanks for that, Tina. Yeah, yeah. Gaby, go ahead.
Gaby Strong:
I love that, Tina, and the mentioning of 1862, because I was at a meeting last night locally here in our Dakota homelands for a land back meeting that dates back to the events of 1862 here in southwest Mni Sota Makoce, the Dakota-US War, the culmination of the exile of our people, our Dakota people from our homelands, the largest mass hanging of our leaders in 1862, the removal of our people that then results in the rich farmlands that Minnesota is known for, the corn and the soybean and the dairy farms. All of those assets date back to those events and the removal, the exile, and the genocidal acts that our people underwent and suffered at that time.
One of our tribal nations here, Upper Sioux [inaudible 00:40:26] these are my relatives and the reclamation of land, public lands adjacent to the tribal lands that exist today. But again, pointing out the land theft that occurred as a result of those events. There's the direct connection to that. It is 2023, but it is directly connected to those events. Again, the thread and of attitude and belief systems and relationship and connection across the years through time, all of those then manifest today. Last night, it was evident. These are serious efforts. These are serious challenges.
But what I'll say about the power of our artistic expression, our cultural creativity, is that it is not just for the perpetuation of our traditions and the beauty of our cultural expression, but for resistance and for change. Our artists are also the carriers and the warriors and the changemakers and the imagination that they are able to share with all of us helps us then to envision this new world, this new normal, a new world of justice and equity. That is also what our artists are capable of and bring forward for us. It is not just our tradition; it is for vision as well. I think we have to challenge ourselves to think in this kind of transformational way, the reimagination, the reimagining of so many things. So, I'm just grateful for our artists and our creatives to be able to help us do that.
Sherylynn Sealy:
Thanks for that, Gaby. I love that reimagining. I feel like that brings everything together. But before we wrap up, I do want to create a little bit more space just in case anyone has final thoughts.
Quita Sullivan:
This is Quita. I have a stupid, tiny little ask for people who are out there thinking about land back. Would you please stop using that GIF that shows land loss in 1776?
Sherylynn Sealy:
Mm-hmm. Yeah. That's right.
Quita Sullivan:
Because the land loss didn't start...
Sherylynn Sealy:
Way before then.
Quita Sullivan:
... in 1776. When you used that, you erase my entire history from your conversation. That's a stupid, teeny little ask. But I'm going to put it out there because as we're talking about this, that is the number one thing people will bring up is that GIF about land loss. When you use that GIF, you are participating in the erasure of hundreds of thousands of people who were here long before 1776.
Sherylynn Sealy:
That's right. Thanks, Quita.
Tina Kuckkahn:
I just love our young warriors. This is Tina. I thought that Jordan Brien, who's our creative director at NDN Collective, he's Turtle Mountain Chippewa, and an artist, he just nailed it at the end of the opening keynote when he said, "Give us our land back; give us back the resources that were extracted from our land, and stop telling us what to do."
Sherylynn Sealy:
Yeah, right. Simply put. I love it. Thanks, Tina. Lori?
Lori Pourier:
Yeah. I just think I really want to just build off what Gaby said because our work at First Peoples Fund really solely focuses on the culture-bearers, the culture=carriers, those that are just quietly, quietly doing the work in community, and they're the first most impacted. I really want to just lift up all of those teachers. Since the pandemic I've been really committed to relearning my language. I think it shifts your thinking and how you walk, interact, and just your relationships to what Tina and folks said early on, to just all living things, and to really honor those ancestors in a different way.
When I speak my language, I find myself getting emotional because I'm just like, wow, where'd that come from?
Sherylynn Sealy:
Aw.
Lori Pourier:
It's just the beauty and the power of that language. With that, most of us really learn our language first in ceremony as we're seeing our relationship to our ancestors that had moved on hundreds of years ago, and we still experience that live in ceremony. So, that's just really just the most precious gift that our ancestors and those culture-bearers give us today. I think I'll just end with that. [Lakota 00:46:01], my sisters. [Lakota 00:46:02] for having us here at Grantmakers in the Arts today.
Sherylynn Sealy:
Of course.
Gaby Strong:
[Dakotah Language].
Quita Sullivan:
[Native Language].
Tina Kuckkahn:
[Ojibwe Language]
Sherylynn Sealy:
All right. Thank you all so much for this conversation. That was fantastic. So informative. I know that all of our listeners will definitely be taking lots away from this. So, thank you.
For those who are listening, if you have any questions about this podcast or any upcoming programming, feel free to reach out to me, Sherylynn Sealy at sherylynn@giarts.org, or visit our website, giarts.org, and be sure to follow Grantmakers in the Arts on Twitter and Facebook @GIArts, as well as Instagram @Grantmakersinthearts for exciting new updates.
Before we go, I just want to reemphasize, when we think about land back, we're thinking about land, but we're also thinking beyond that. So, give back to the people who it belongs to. Thank you everyone for listening.
