: Phil Bellfy
: Honor the Earth Indigenous Response to Environmental Degradation in the Great Lakes
: Modern History Press
: 9781615996278
: 1
: CHF 8.30
:
: Sonstiges
: English
: 302
: DRM
: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
: ePUB

The Great Lakes Basin is under severe ecological threat from fracking, bursting pipelines, sulfide mining, abandonment of government environmental regulation, invasive species, warming and lowering of the lakes, etc. This book presents essays on Traditional Knowledge, Indigenous Responsibility, and how Indigenous people, governments, and NGOs are responding to the environmental degradation which threatens the Great Lakes. This volume grew out of a conference that was held on the campus of Michigan State University on Earth Day, 2007.
All of the essays have been updated and revised for this book. Among the presenters were Ward Churchill (author and activist), Joyce Tekahnawiiaks King (Director, Akwesasne Justice Department), Frank Ettawageshik, (Executive Director of the United Tribes of Michigan), Aaron Payment (Chair of the Sault Sainte Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians), and Dean Sayers (Chief of the Batchewana First Nation). Winona LaDuke (author, activist, twice Green Party VP candidate) also contributed to this volume.
Adapted from the Introduction by Dr. Phil Bellfy: 'The elements of the relationship that the Great Lakes' ancient peoples had with their environment, developed over the millennia, was based on respect for the natural landscape, pure and simple. The 'original people' of this area not only maintained their lives, they thrived within the natural boundaries established by their relationship with the natural world. In today's vocabulary, it may be something as simple as an understanding that if human beings take care of the environment, the environment will take care of them. The entire relationship can be summarized as 'harmony and balance, based on respect.'

PREFACE

Aki: The Spirit of the Land is in Our Language

Maaganiit Noodin

Shkaakaamikwe / Mazikaamikwe Ezhi-ni’gikenimaanaan

Miigwetch kina gwaya gii bi dagoshinoyeg miinwa bizindawiyeg.

Biindigeg,

Come in

Enji-Anishinaabemong

Where Anishinaabemowin is spoken

Enji-manjimendaming

Where there is remembering

Enji-gikendaasong

A place of knowing

Enji-zaagi'iding

A place of love

Bizandamog,

Listen

Enendamowinan zhaabobideg ode'ng

Ideas run through hearts

Bawaajigewinan waasa izhaamigag

Dreams go far

Anamejig niimiwag dibishkoo mewenzha

Those who pray dance like long ago

Kina bimaadizijig miinwaa wesiiyag owaabandaanaawaa bidaasigemigog

All the people and animals see it, the light coming

Bimaadizig

Live

Nisawayi'iing misko-biidaabang idash ni misko-pangishimag

Between the red dawn and the red sunset

Nisawayi'iing giizis idash ni niibaadibikad'giizis

Between the sun (or the month) and the full moon (time passing)

Nisawayi'iing manidoog idash wiindigoog

Between the spirits we love and the ones who devour

Nisawayi'iing awanong idash ankwadong mii ji-mikaman gdo'ojichaakam

Between the fog and the clouds you can find your soul

Biindigeg, weweni bizindamog, minobimaadizig

Come in, carefully listen, live well.

“Biindigeg, weweni bizindamog, minobimaadizig,”

I write these words as an invitation to understand our relationship with “aki / land.” She is the center of existence; the source of life, to know her is to understand the universe. To know her requires the quiet acts of listening, dreaming and believing. To know her also requires that we walk, we move across her surface, through days and nights, springs and winters, witnessing and protecting all that she is. Our relationship with her is one of science, politics, art, ecology, health, and in my case, language, especially as it rearranges itself in songs and poetry.

It is imperative that we preserve the language that allows us to better understand the Anishinaabe relationship with aki. It is equally as important that we celebrate aki by using that language, keeping that way of knowing flowing like the rivers to the oceans, because that rhythm of motion between the land and the language is one of the things that keeps us alive.

Although there are undoubtedly innumerable examples I have yet to discover, there are a few that appear most striking to me: the word “aki” and some of its relatives; the names used to talk about the life-giver Aki; and the way we talk about what we do with her gift of life.

Aki is such a small word and yet, many language teachers believe that the smallest, simplest pieces of