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Salzburg Global Fellow Vicky Stott explains the connection of Native Nations to land amid modern geopolitical borders
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This op-ed was written by Vicky Stott, who attended the Salzburg Global American Studies program "Beyond the Nation-State? Borders, Boundaries, and the Future of Democratic Pluralism" from September 19 to 23, 2023.
The struggle for Indigenous people has always been connected to land. I am an Indigenous person, and more specifically, a citizen of the Ho-Chunk Nation in Wisconsin, which is one of the Native Nations in the Great Lakes region of the United States. Through the lens of a Native person in the United States today, I understand geopolitical borders to be imaginary boundaries that have been created by colonial powers.
My identity as a Ho-Chunk tribal person is directly connected to our lands as a Native Nation, and the border forced upon us by a colonial system fractured and dismantled hundreds of years of fluid movement and cultural ecosystems of Native Nations across the country. Our connections as Native Nations to Turtle Island, which we refer to as the North American continent, extend beyond our reservation borders and territories today.
Indigenous communities have a deep sense of belonging and relationship to place. We have sacred and cultural sites and kinship ecosystems that go beyond geopolitical borders. The human-made borders of today are seen as imaginary by Indigenous people because we have a different perspective and lens in which we regard and care for land. We see the Earth as our Mother, and each of us, as Native people, has a role within our tribal nations, within our communities, and within our clans and families, to safeguard our lands so that Seven Generations into the future, our Earth will remain healthy and continue to sustain life for future generations of human beings.
Whether you are living on a tribal reservation, in a rural or urban area, as Native people, we belong to our Native Nations as citizens and as tribal members. With the connection to our communities and families, we still have a relationship to the land regardless of geopolitical borders. With the forced removal of Native people from our traditional lands during the 1800s and 1900s, Native communities were made to live on tribal reservations delineated by the United States federal government. The isolation of many of the reservation lands contributed to the invisibility of Native people. Native Nations continue to exert their sovereignty over tribal lands, and at the same time, Native people must navigate the world outside of reservation borders.
It is a challenging dichotomy to hold, knowing as an Indigenous person that we do not see geopolitical borders in the same way as colonial powers. We did not create these borders, and through affirming our sovereignty as Native Nations, we continue to safeguard hundreds of years of cultural practices and languages that are deeply intertwined with the land.
There is an annual summit that brings together multiple Native Nations across the United States to focus on tribal borders. The gathering is dedicated to developing and solidifying legal frameworks that will enable Indigenous people and communities to move freely in a world full of geopolitical borders. There are more than 40 tribes in the United States that have lands that physically straddle the border, to which tribal histories and connections to land and families transcend boundaries. These types of summits focused on Indigenous territories enable Native people to maintain and safeguard social, cultural, and land rights and assist Native Nations with affirming and exerting their sovereignty to protect Indigenous human rights. The Indigenous worldview is focused on preserving and perpetuating tribal cultures and practices that are not separate from land rights, as our connection to land is interwoven into our identity and spirituality.
Vicky Stott is a senior program officer for the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. She serves as the team leader for the Foundation's Racial Equity and Community Engagement team and is responsible for grantmaking focused on racial justice.
Vicky attended the Salzburg Global American Studies program "Beyond the Nation-State? Borders, Boundaries, and the Future of Democratic Pluralism" from September 19 to 23, 2023. The 2023 Salzburg Global American Studies Program focused on the contestations and renegotiations of boundaries beyond the nation-state, and how they are changing the representation of democratic pluralism.