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Indigenous Fellows discuss resilience, cultural heritage, and the ongoing struggle for Tribal sovereignty

Photo Credit: Christian Streili

As Indigenous women living in the US, Vicky Stott and Karen Diver shared their perspectives on modern geopolitical borders. Their comments highlight the importance of bringing Tribal nations into the conversation about borders and land ownership.

Before modern-day borders, Indigenous communities could move fluidly across the North American continent. Vicky described how Tribes “had very detailed, very intrinsic transit systems all throughout the continent. We had economies that were built off a very Indigenized system. We had an entire food economy that existed before 1492 that really helped pave the way for us to maintain our nationhood [and] who we are as Indigenous people."

The impact of borders on Indigenous communities in North America has been to “impact and disrupt our families, our cultural structures, our languages, [and] our ways of being”, Vicky reflected. She “does not recognize the geopolitical borders, especially in the United States” and views these as “colonial borders” because of the violence that her family, community, and Tribal nation have experienced as a result of colonialism.

Land is vital to Tribal communities because “our Indigenous homelands, our land, the physical infrastructure of it, [and] the space of it is very much connected to our language, our culture, and our spirituality, how we connect to it, how we see it, [and] how we envision it," explained Vicky. However, her tribe does not have a dedicated reservation and instead has “had to fight for our lands to gain them back. We have had to use our own financial resources to purchase back our traditional homelands."

Karen added that for many Indigenous groups, reservation boundaries “delineate the small amount we have left of our homelands”. Her tribe has also had to work to purchase their land back from private owners, which is a priority for them as “those remaining homelands became a method of our survival because our Indigeneity is tied to that relationship with land".

Stressing the ability of Tribal nations to govern themselves and manage their own land, Karen encouraged others to “understand the absolute right of Indigenous peoples in the US and Canada, and increasingly so in other places where they're fighting for their land tenure rights. They are people who have governed themselves long before colonizers showed up."

Karen explained the importance of Tribal citizens holding dual citizenship to both their Tribal nation and country, as Tribes “are a cultural people. We are not just a race. But more importantly, because of treaty obligations, we are a political entity."

Working with Indigenous communities in other countries, Vicky’s work centers around “supporting and safeguarding the rights of Indigenous people across various countries” and pushing for the inclusion of Indigenous voices in international organizations like the EU or UN. She spreads the message of “affirming our identity, affirming our sense of human agency, who we are, our connection to the land, and the significance of that”. 

The challenges facing Tribal nations connect with the struggles of other oppressed communities both in the US and worldwide. Vicky emphasized the importance of building solidarity networks across communities, remarking that “when we're able to see each other, we're able to understand what we do, what we experience as part of being a human being, [and] that it's all connected. Your struggle is our struggle, and our struggle is your struggle”.

Allowing Tribal nations to develop for their own benefit is “about creating wellness in a community and self-determination and promoting self-governance,” Karen explained. She pointed to several long-term goals for Tribal nations, including that the government “give us our land back at least within the reservations. Give us access to traditional territories, which are broader than our reservation borders, because those are our traditional use areas, [and] resource us adequately."

In working towards these goals, Vicky elaborated that “Tribes being able to leverage our sovereignty and our treaty rights can play a significant role in terms of the conversations that we can have, [and] in terms of how we engage with our government in the changes and the transformation that needs to take place. I think that part of this is also us continuing to develop relationships with each other [and] building community, which is going to be especially necessary going forward."

As Karen poignantly reflected, “You can remove the native from their homeland, but you cannot remove it from their heart." For Karen, Vicky, and other Indigenous peoples, the conversation about borders and land ownership is essential for the preservation of their culture and the promotion of their rights.

Vicky Stott and Karen Diver attended the Salzburg Global American Studies program on “Beyond the Nation-State? Borders, Boundaries, and the Future of Democratic Pluralism” from September 19-23, 2023. This program focused on the contestations and renegotiations of boundaries beyond the nation-state, and how they are changing the representation of democratic pluralism.