December 24-30, 2008: Five Key Indigenous Peoples Issues

Five Important Indigenous People's Issues for the Week of December 24 - 30, 2008


Canada: Dene Leader Takes Message To United Nations

The Dene National chief is tired of the federal government's failure to represent aboriginal people on issues of climate change.

Arctic regions are more sensitive to the affects of global warming than other regions was the message Bill Erasmus brought to Poznan, Poland. He attended a United Nations climate change conference there earlier this month to speak about climate shift and what it means for the North's indigenous peoples.

He also criticized the Canadian government for not adequately representing aboriginal people when it comes to the issue.

"The way the United Nations works is only nation-states have a say at the table," said Erasmus.

"So indigenous peoples there didn't have an equal opportunity to say the things they wanted to, to fully participate."

Erasmus represented the Arctic Athabaskan Council - with members from Alaska, the Yukon and NWT - at the negotiations and said because the Canadian government has not lived up to its obligations under the Kyoto protocol, Canada's delegation United Nations conferences do not speak for indigenous people or many people in Canada.

"We have to have the right to speak for ourselves," he said. "The federal government does not represent our people at the table."

Erasmus pointed to Canada's refusal to support the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which was brought up at the negotiations. Erasmus said he was disappointed federal Environment Minister Jim Prentice chose not to support the issue when it came up. Read more about Erasmus at the UN here....


Fiji: Indigenous People's Rights A Must

Sixty years ago, in 1948, the World was still reeling from the shock of the human rights abuses which occurred during World War II when they signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). During World War II, millions of civilians were killed and tortured based on their race or religion, and the World was determined to prevent the reoccurrence of crimes against humanity on this scale. The International recognition of core human rights which were considered universal and egalitarian was a major development for human rights.

The Declaration enshrined core beliefs on human rights and fundamental freedoms such as the right to life, the right to liberty, freedom of expression and equality before the law. The concept of human rights in this sense was nothing new, and was already encoded in various national constitutions, legislation and treaties, such as the American Declaration of Independence (1776), the French Declaration on the Rights of Man and Citizen (1789) and the English Magna Carta (1215). The UDHR received unanimous support from UN Member states and was the most significant event in modern human rights development.

Since then, there have been a number of international conventions which promote and protect human rights, including but not limited to:-

• International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1976);
• International Covenant on Economical, Social and Cultural Rights (1976);
• Convention on Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination (1969);
• Convention on Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (1981);
• Convention on the Rights of the Child (1990);
• Declaration on the Rights of Persons belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities (1992);
• Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2006); and most recently,
• Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2007).

Read more about protecting human rights here....


Borneo: Indigenous Women Earn A Pittance Weaving Rattan For Japan

It is almost 11 a.m. and Ati has already been working with rattan peels for four hours.

Yet, even though the pay is low, Ati, who like many Indonesians goes by a single name, maintains complete concentration while weaving a piece of rattan carpet destined to fetch a high price in Japan.

The 48-year-old woman is weaving a "kati," popularly known in Japan as a rattan "ajiro" carpet, a hand-woven mat made of rattan with peels only 2 mm in width and woven diagonally.

She lives in Kapuas, a small village in Borneo's Central Kalimantan Province peopled mostly by indigenous Dayaks.

Half the population of about 2,000 earns a living in the rattan carpet industry.

Compared with other weavers, though, Ati is a major talent. She is always assigned to weave the "super-quality" ajiro carpets made of sega, or Calamus caesius, a species of rattan found only in the wilds of Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines.

Sega's uniquely glossy golden surface makes it highly sought after for tatami mats and rattan carpets for the Japanese market. Read more about indigenous Dayaks weaving here....


Arctic: Indigenous Arctic Peoples Claim Their Right To Cold Temperatures

"Terrifying" is the word that best describes the situation of a hunter who is lost on shifting ice, or of the homeowner whose house splits in two when its foundation sinks, says Canadian indigenous leader Mary Simon when asked about the effects of global warming on the Inuit people.

Climate change is rapidly changing the ecology of the Arctic and creating a crisis for the 160,000 indigenous people in the region, collectively known as Inuit, who are thinly spread along the edges of the Arctic Ocean in Canada, Greenland, Norway, Russia and the U.S. state of Alaska.

The region is too cold for trees, and only grass and small bushes can survive the short three-month summer where temperatures average 6 to 8 degrees Celsius.

During the nine-month cold season the land and sea are snow-covered and frozen. In winter, because the sun does not rise over the horizon, darkness reigns 24 hours a day and the average temperature is -30 degrees C, reaching -60 C on the coldest of days.

Despite these challenging conditions, the Inuit have survived there for thousands of years, hunting seals, walrus, whales and caribou.

They once lived in houses made of whalebone and thick clumps of grass and earth, as well as houses made of snow. Today they live in wooden houses made of materials imported from thousands of kilometres away.

But their land of snow and ice that sustained them for so long is melting as average temperatures climb two to three times faster than anywhere else in the world.

"We live off the land hunting and fishing for our food, but that is getting harder and harder because everything is changing," Simon told Tierramérica.

Leader of Canada’s Inuit and former Canadian ambassador to Denmark, Simon was born in the village of Kangiqsualujjuaq, in the extreme north of Quebec province. Tierramérica spoke with her in Quebec City. Read more about arctic climate change here....


International: Worst Companies In The World: US, Monsanto, Peabody and Barrick


The United States was voted the "Worst Company in the World," in a reader poll conducted by the Censored News blog that ended today. Readers, primarily Indigenous Peoples, voted Monsanto as the second Worst Company in the World. Peabody Energy Corp., recently granted a life of mine permit to expand coal mining on Navajo and Hopi lands, was voted the third Worst Company in the World.

Barrick Gold Corp., which began the destruction of the Western Shoshone's Mount Tenabo region during Thanksgiving, was voted the fourth Worst Company in the World. Blackwater Worldwide, responsible for murders and brutality worldwide, was voted the fifth Worst Company in the World. GEO Group, Inc., formerly Wackenhut, profiteering from the misery of migrants and people of color in prisons, was voted the sixth Worst Company in the World.

Cameco uranium mining and Sithe Global/Navajo Nation, tied for the seventh Worst Company in the World. Israel's Elbit Systems and Raytheon tied for eighth place. Boeing, constructing the US/Mexico Apartheid Border Wall, followed in ninth place. Newmont Mining was voted the 10th Worst Company in the World by the readers of Censored News blog, which focuses on the censored news of Indigenous Peoples and international human rights.

The United States emerged in truth as one of the worst violators of international human rights during the Bush regime, with torture, kidnappings and secret renditions in violation of the Geneva Conventions. The bogus war in Iraq resulted in the widespread murder and displacement of Iraqi people. Corporations seized the freefall of US democracy, with mercenaries, private prison profiteers and war manufacturers reveling in their profits. During the Bush regime, the United States ceased to be viewed as a democracy by many US citizens, who now view the United States as a company comprised of select individuals seeking corporate gain and control. Read more about the worst companies in the world here....


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December 17-23, 2008: Five Key Indigenous Peoples Issues

Five Important Indigenous People's Issues for the Week of December 17 - 23, 2008


Canada: Climate Change - Arctic Is the Canary in the Coalmine

Nearly 1,000 scientists and representatives of indigenous peoples from 16 countries have braved a major winter storm to share their findings and concerns about the rapidly warming Arctic region at the International Arctic Change conference in Quebec City.

The Arctic is "ground zero" for climate change, with temperatures rising far faster than anywhere else on the planet. Some predict an ice-free summer Arctic in less than five to 10 years -- the first time the Arctic Ocean will be exposed to the sun in many hundreds of thousands of years.

The speed of change has scientists scrambling to understand the impacts on indigenous people, wildlife and ecology.

"The Arctic will be full of future surprises," said David Carlson, an oceanographer and director of the International Polar Year programme office.

"Protected by its cover of sea ice, the Arctic Ocean is the last unblemished ocean on the planet," Carlson told IPS.

The loss of the ice, the thermal blanket that keeps the Arctic region cold, will have huge impacts on the weather in the northern hemisphere. The difference in temperatures between the polar regions and the tropical regions is what drives the planet's weather. A warmer Arctic means storm tracks and precipitation patterns will shift all across the middle of North America, Europe and Asia, he said.

"The extraordinary attendance from all over the circumpolar world illustrates the urgency of coordinating action to face the impacts of warming and modernisation in the Arctic, said Louis Fortier, scientific director of ArcticNet, a Canadian research network and host of the International Arctic Change conference. Read more about climate change in Canada here....


Australia: The Big Read - The 2008 NIT Blacklist

2008 was a year of highs and lows for Aboriginal Australia. The high was, undoubtedly, the national apology in February. But the lows were... well, take your pick. The federal government's failure to endorse the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, its handling of the NT intervention, the NT government's axing of the bilingual education program. And the list goes on. In no particular order, AMY McQUIRE and CHRIS GRAHAM take a look at 101 of the 'less impressive' moments of 2008.

1. In November, NT Deputy Chief Minister Marion Scrymgour, who is the most senior Indigenous politician in the country, announced that English would be taught in the first four hours of the school day in bilingual schools, effectively ending bilingual education in the NT. All of the available evidence - both in Australia and internationally - shows that bi-lingual education is the best way to teach children whose first language is not English. The NT government's decision to abolish it will undoubtedly lead to poorer literacy outcomes, and reduced school attendance among Aboriginal students.

2. Federally, Labor promised to make the "protection, preservation and revitalisation" of Indigenous languages a "major priority".

3. Kevin Rudd's sorry speech inspired a nation. Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson's speech in reply did not. And nor did the conduct of quite a few of his Liberal colleagues. About 1,000 people listening to Nelson's speech in the Great Hall of Parliament stood and turned their backs on him, including two of Rudd's own staffers. Why? Because Nelson seemed to mistakenly think the day was all about him and his own troubled childhood. He also thought it was about reminding everyone of child abuse in Central Australia.

4. Member for O'Connor, Wilson Tuckey couldn't help himself either. After loudly reciting the Lord's Prayer, Tuckey walked out of the chamber and boycotted the apology.

Read the rest of the NIT list here....


Brazil: Ruling Puts Brazil Closer to Creating a Large Indigenous Reserve

Brazil’s Supreme Court this week appeared to pave the way for the creation of a huge indigenous reserve in the Amazon that is larger than the state of Connecticut but home to only 19,000 Indians.

In a vote being closely watched by environmentalists and by advocates for the rights of indigenous people, 8 of 11 judges on the court voted Wednesday to uphold President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s creation of the Raposa Serra do Sol reserve, which runs along the Venezuelan border in the northern Brazilian state of Roraima.

The reserve would be one of the largest protected indigenous areas in the world. It has set off a sharp controversy over property rights, the limits of government authority and the rights of Indians to their original lands.

The reserve was decreed by Mr. da Silva’s government in 2005 after a legal battle of more more than 20 years. At more than four million acres, it encompasses about 42 percent of Roraima State and is 11 times bigger than the city of São Paulo.

The Supreme Court suspended the enactment of its ruling indefinitely after one judge, Marco Aurélio Mello, said he needed more time to consider his decision. The court needs only a majority to approve the measure.

The suspension seemed to lower tensions that had been mounting in the territory in recent days, as Indians and farmers both threatened violence before the court’s vote.

Justice Minister Tarso Genro sounded a conciliatory note, saying in televised comments on Thursday that the confirmation of a majority of judges was not a victory of Indians over non-Indians, but rather a reaffirmation of a policy meant to protect the rights of Indian communities “without giving up the sovereignty of national territory.” Read more about Brazil's landmark ruling here....


Argentina: Bringing Films and Filmmaking to Indigenous Communities

With the assistance of experts from Bolivia, indigenous communities in the northeastern Argentine province of Chaco are learning how to make films, as a means of helping the rest of the world understand their way of life and the problems they face.

"Just as indigenous people once adopted writing, which allowed others to get to know us, we now want to make use of this new tool to help people learn about us," Juan Chico, a historian from the Qom (Toba) indigenous community in Chaco, told IPS.

"Whites tend to show images that cast us in a negative light," said Chico, who took part in a recent workshop for indigenous people interested in learning about filmmaking. "For example, in the Chaco provincial government building, there are photos of malnourished indigenous people taken without the subject’s permission. Perhaps the aim is to awaken pity. But no one ever shows that there also excellent writers, musicians and artists among us."

The idea arose this year in the Under-Secretariat of Culture in Chaco, one of Argentina’s poorest provinces. The provincial population of around one million people includes 60,000 members of the Qom, Mocoví and Wichí indigenous groups, who have their own leaders and institutions that represent them.

Most of the population of northern Argentina is "mestizo" -- of mixed European and indigenous origin. Read more about indigenous filmmaking in Argentina here....


Mexico: Indigenous Groups Keep Ancient Sports Alive in Mexico

Athletes file onto the field carrying a mystifying array of sporting tools: tree trunks, gourds, dried palm fronds and balls made of woven cornstalk.
These aren't your typical ballplayers.

Instead of jerseys and spandex, the girls wear brilliant white dresses embroidered with purple and red flowers; the boys wear the track suits of yore: loose-fitting pants made of flowing cotton.

Five centuries after the Spanish conquered the Aztecs, soccer is the premier sport of Latin America. But dedicated indigenous groups and aficionados are trying to keep alive the ancient sports of the Americas.

"We have 4,000 years of history in Mexico, and these games connect us to that," said Alida Zurita Bocanegra, president of the Mexican Association of Traditional and Autoctonous Games and Sports . "Globalization is permeating us, and that's why it's so important at this moment to revive the roots that give us identity."

Once a year, supporters of the ancient sports stage an exhibition of games like pash pash, corozo, garabato and kuachancaca. In November, they came to Villahermosa, a humid, lowland capital in southern Mexico's Tabasco state that was once home to the Olmec, an ancient civilization that predates the Maya.

Organizers hope to keep the sports from dying off, as have a number of indigenous languages and traditions in the modern age. Their goal is to teach the games in schools and arrange tournaments among indigenous groups from around the country.
King of the pre-Hispanic sports scene was "ballgame," a fiendishly difficult game played on a court in which a 9-pound rubber ball is moved along with the hip or thigh — something like volleyball without a net.

Once the continent's dominant sport, a version of the game was played by both the Mayans and the Aztecs. Read more about indigenous sports in Mexico here....


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Indigenous Peoples Education: News from the World Conference in Melbourne

Shaping the Future of World Indigenous Education is an update on the World Indigenous Peoples' Conference: Education, held in Melbourne last week. This post comes from friend Kevin Rennie over at the Labor View From Bayside blog.

Last week 3000 delegates from around the world shared their experiences at The World Indigenous Peoples' Conference: Education at Rod Laver Arena in Melbourne. There has been little coverage by the mainstream media and surprisingly little activity in the global blogosphere that I’m aware of.

Carbon Media produced excellent video for National Indigenous TV (NITV) that is available at Black Tracks. Their 5 episodes include interviews with leading keynote speakers and conference delegates. A sample of the video interviews:

Black Tracks Melbourne Vodcast Episode 1 from Carbon Media.

Read more about the World Indigenous Peoples Conference on Education here.

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Latin American Perspectives: Call for Contributions to Special Editions/Issues

Latin American Perspectives: Globalizing Resistance-The New Politics of Social Movements in Latin America

Issue Editors: Richard Stahler-Sholk, Harry E. Vanden, and Glen Kuecker

A first issue on this topic was published in the March 2007 issue; manuscripts are now being solicited for a second issue

The last two decades have seen an upsurge of Latin American social movements, challenging the neoliberal paradigm and the governments that impose it. Movements such as the indigenous mobilizations of CONAIE in Ecuador, the cocaleros and mobilizations against water privatizations and gas pipeline investments in Bolivia, the Zapatista movement in Mexico, the landless rural workers of the MST in Brazil, Afro-Colombians resisting displacement in a region coveted by investors, and the piquetero eruptions of workers and the urban poor in the wake of Argentina's financial crisis, are contesting the region's political and economic systems.

These phenomena defy the expectations of the mainstream "transitology" literature, which saw social movements as a temporary outgrowth of the suppression of conventional politics by bureaucratic-authoritarian regimes, a trend that would fade again with the return of electoral democracy. The intensification of social movements appears to be not only an outgrowth of the traditional resistance and mobilization of the masses, but a response to the advance of neoliberal globalization. This resistance is, however, by no means exclusively manifested in class-based organizing. The global spread of free trade/market forces involves a rollback of the state, yet the neoliberal state has new functions of structuring and policing the new conditions for global capital accumulation. In this era of increasing globalization, pressure to integrate into global markets threatens a heterogeneous group of social subjects who are coalescing into new resistance movements.

These new movements seek to define a novel relation to the political realm. Unlike traditional guerrilla movements or electoral expressions of the left, they are not fundamentally organized to seize state power. Yet they have contributed to destabilizing and in some cases ousting governments (e.g. Bolivia, Argentina, Ecuador, and arguably Mexico's PRI), while coexisting in awkward relationships with left parties and guerrilla movements (e.g. Brazil's PT, and Mexico's PRD party and EPR/ERPI guerrillas). Parallel to the increase in social protest movements is the development of movement-based politics of a populist variety, such as Lavalas in Haiti and chavismo in Venezuela. From the Argentine cry of "que se vayan todos" to the Zapatista concept of "mandar obedeciendo," these movements are struggling for a radical redefinition of politics.

This issue of Latin America Perspectives will explore the roots and implications of social movement formation and their resistance to neoliberalism. Articles might examine the common explanatory elements of this phenomenon; the strategic elements of social movement confrontations with the neoliberal project of global capital; specific country or sectoral examples that illustrate aspects of this phenomenon and its political impact; how these new movements are different from previous popular mobilizations; or regional and transnational forms of social movement organizing.

Some of the questions that might be addressed in the issue include:

• What is new about Latin American social movements since the 1980s?
• What are the new spaces and modes of organizing against the neoliberal project?
• Are these movements necessarily more internally democratic or progressive than other forms of organizing?
• What strategies are effective in forging solidarity and counteracting the atomization produced by the uniform application of neoliberal programs?
• Can these movements effect the policy changes they want without taking power or being part of a coalition that does?
• By concentrating on society and not on the political organization of state power, are such movements capable of winning and defending lasting change? What should their relationship be to political parties and other institutions?
• Is social movement resistance forcing adaptations in the "Washington consensus" on neoliberal economics, and/or in the politics of counterinsurgency?
• Is there an emerging new popular economy, a model of local self-sufficiency that represents viable alternatives to the logic of global capitalism?
• What is the relation between the politics of identity (race, ethnicity, gender) and class in organizing resistance against neoliberal globalization?
• Are social movements vulnerable to cooptation by the new "civil society" projects and discourse purveyed by international financial institutions and NGOs?
• How are popular movement strategies affected when left-leaning governments come to power and face the discipline of global financial markets?
• What is the relationship between the resurgence of social movements and the various new populisms (left and right variants) that also seem to accompany the neoliberal era?
• Do transnational social movement networks compromise the autonomy of local forms of resistance to neoliberalism, or are they essential for confronting global capitalism?
• What is the potential of regional social movement solidarity (such as the Latin American women's movement, Vía Campesina, or the Mesoamerican coalitions against Plan Puebla Panamá)?

Prospective contributors should feel free to communicate with the coordinators of this issue:

Richard Stahler-Sholk, Eastern Michigan University:
rstahler[at]emich.edu
Harry E. Vanden, University of South Florida:
vanden[at]chuma1.cas.usf.edu
Glen Kuecker, DePauw University: gkuecker[at]depauw.edu

Manuscripts should be no longer than 25 pages of double-spaced text in English, Spanish, or Portuguese. If possible, submit two copies along with a cover sheet and basic biographical information. With these items, we also require that the manuscript be sent on a CD-R, by e-mail, or on a floppy disk if the other formats are not available. The LAP style guide is available on request or online.

Please send any manuscript submissions to:

Managing Editor, Latin American Perspectives¸ P.O. Box 5703,
Riverside, California 92517-5703

Latin American Perspectives: Ecological Struggle in Latin America: Development, Scarcity and Environmental Justice in the Wake of Globalization

Issue Editor: Pamela Stricker

In its second special issue on the environment, Latin American Perspectives examines the continuing environmental crisis in the wake of globalization and popular responses to the crisis. In doing so, we are looking for articles in five general categories: a) examination of conflicts (neoliberal and/or domestic) over resource scarcity (oil, water, timber, arable land, etc.); b) Latin American state responses and/or alternative visions to the environmental crisis; c) popular movements and activists struggling for environmental justice; d) analyses of causes of the ecological crisis (particularly those resulting from capitalist accumulation, globalization, neoliberal development), and e) analysis of the relationship between consumerism and materialism, resource use, pollution, neoliberal economic restructuring, and global distribution of wealth in Latin America.

States often respond to questions of poverty with environmentally destructive models of economic growth that exacerbate resource degradation and fail to bring about social justice for the poor, often under the threat of neoliberal economic restructuring. However, popular movements are attempting to reformulate the development debate by linking basic human needs and limits of nature. Further as natural resources decline or are appropriated by global capital forces, the resulting development fails to sustain either the local populace or the country’s natural resources.

Again, popular movements (and some states) have struggled against the neoliberal forces seeking to appropriate their natural resources. Finally, Latin Americans know that a “Better World is Possible,” that is, where environmental justice concerns of the populace are addressed.

In that spirit, we seek pieces that critically analyze the environmental crisis in one of the areas. We also welcome articles documenting and critically analyzing the struggles of Latin Americans struggling for environmental justice against the forces of global capital.

Possible topics include but are not limited to:

1) Conflicts over resource scarcity

---Critical analysis of Latin American petroleum politics and the global quest for oil.

---Critical analysis of privatization of natural resources (e.g. water and Cochabamba)

---Critical analysis of conflicts over natural resources (imperial and/or domestic)

2) Alternative Visions and the Environmental Crisis

---Theoretical pieces recasting development to consider both human needs and sustainable conservation of natural resources (local, national or regional levels).

3) State Policies and Programs in Response to the Crisis

---Critical analysis of state policy and programs in response to the environmental crisis.

---Critical analysis of role of non-governmental organizations, international governmental agencies, etc. on development and environment.

4) Popular and Social Movements and Struggles around Environmental Crisis

--Theoretically grounded case studies of environmental activists and their struggles around the environmental crisis;

--Critical analysis of ecotourism efforts (failures and successes);

--Critical analysis of interconnectedness between indigenous peoples, indigenous knowledge, and environment, again placed within a theoretical framework and the realities of the Americas.

5) Sources of ecological crisis in Latin America

--Critical analysis of globalization and/or neoliberalism and the exacerbation of the ecological crisis

-- Critical analysis of environmental impacts of natural disasters on traditional development strategies (particularly those exacerbated by global warming)

--Critical analysis of impact of environmentally-destructive activities on health and well-being of population, (e.g. pollution, farmworker pesticide poisoning, global warming, destruction of rainforest, etc.)

6) Consumerism, pollution, resources and globalization

---Critical analysis of consumerism and materialism and environmental degradation in Latin America

---Critical analysis of neoliberal economic restructuring and resource use and/or access in Latin America.

Latin American Perspectives is a theoretical and scholarly journal for discussion and debate on the political economy of capitalism, imperialism, and socialism in the Americas. Therefore, we hope that potential contributors will situate their analyses of environmental issues within critical literature as well as those works seeking to push the literature in new directions.

Pamela Stricker is coordinating this issue. Prospective contributors should feel free to communicate with her at the following address:

Pamela Stricker, Ph.D.
Political Science Department
California State University, San Marcos
San Marcos, CA 92096-0001

stricker@csusm.edu

Manuscripts should be no longer than 25 pages of double-spaced text in English, Spanish, or Portuguese. If possible, submit two copies along with a cover sheet and basic biographical information. With these items, we also require that the manuscript be sent on a CD-R, by e-mail, or on a floppy disk if the other formats are not available. The LAP style guide is available on request or online.

Please send any manuscript submissions to:

Managing Editor, Latin American Perspectives¸ P.O. Box 5703, Riverside, California 92517-5703

Peruvian Migration in a Global Context

Issue Editors: Ayumi Takenaka, Karsten Paerregaard, and Ulla Berg

This issue of Latin American Perspectives explores contemporary Peruvian migration by examining how relations of inequality and structures of domination in Peru drive people to migrate - both internally and internationally - and how migration, in turn, affects such relations and structures. Historically, migration in Peru has been spurred and shaped by a complex set of racial, ethnic, and class relations, but it has also shaped and altered these categories in significant ways. During the colonial period, African and European immigration contributed to the country’s ethnic diversity whereas rural-urban migration in the context of 20th century capitalist expansion and rapid urbanization led to important changes in the country’s class and power structure. More recently, the economic and political crisis that Peru experienced in the 1980s, 1990s and the first half of the new millennium has prompted an exodus of Peruvians from almost all the country’s social classes and ethnic group to the extent that migration today is regarded as the principal means to achieve social mobility not only by working-class (some of indigenous descent) but also middle-class Peruvians. This issue addresses from various angles how the close link between class and a racialized geography within Peru has generated the notion that geographical mobility is a primary mechanism to achieve social mobility.

Currently, Peruvians are dispersed around the globe to more than 25 countries, and the rate of emigration is still accelerating. Peruvian migrants also represent diverse racial, ethnic, and class backgrounds. The diversity and intensity of the various waves in Peruvian migration history cannot be understood independent of hegemonic structures based on class, ethnicity, and geography. Upper-middle class Peruvians from Lima tend to concentrate in certain areas of Miami, whereas those of the urban working class migrate mostly to places including Paterson (NJ), Barcelona, Buenos Aires, and Santiago. Andean villagers congregate in Hartford (CT) and Washington DC, and migrants in Japan are mostly urban middle-class of Japanese descent. While all migrants leave their country hoping to achieve upward mobility, this pattern of migration also reproduces Peru’s social structure abroad where migrant communities are socially segmented based on these “pre-migration” social and economic hierarchies.

Based on ethnographic, demographic and historical research in Peru, the US, Japan, Spain, Italy and Chile, the articles in this issue empirically show how exactly migration relates to, and potentially transforms, dominant social and economic structures in Peru. They do so by examining the strategies that Peruvian migrants from different class and ethnic backgrounds use to mobilize resources necessary to migrate and adapt to the receiving context. They also analyze the power relations affecting these strategies--how migrants and their relatives in Peru negotiate and reconfigure these relations during the course of migration, and how this process is shaped by new forms of exploitation and domination to which migrants submit themselves in their efforts to establish new lives in Peru’s urban centers and foreign destinations. Finally, the issue discusses the local, national and global mechanisms that alternately propel and thwart migrants to engage in transnational activities in their regions of origin in Peru and scrutinizes the institutions and networks, including the tensions and conflicts emerging from these, that migrants draw on or produce to carry out these activities.

A thorough and comparative examination of Peruvian migration will shed light on a number of important questions for the study of the economic and social forces that drive to people to migrate, internally as well as transnationally. First, it allows us to understand the relation between physical and social mobility in the Peruvian context and analyze how already ongoing rural-urban migration processes shape current patterns and experiences of transnational migration. Second, it provides us with a productive lens to study the class structure and relations of domination that shape the livelihood strategies and migration practices of hundreds of thousands of Peruvians. Third, it instigates us to explore the new forms of dependency and domination that migration processes produce in migrants’ regions of origin and to examine the tensions and conflicts that they generate between those who access important migrant networks and those who do not. Finally, this perspective allows us to examine how migrants’ absence and their remittances may transform – symbolically or materially - relations of inequality and existing power structures in Peru.

Transnational migration has also recently become a key political issue in Peru. According to the Peruvian state, close to 10% of the total population now live abroad, and popular media opinion polls have recently indicated that 75% of youths, including well-educated professionals, aspire to emigrate in the near future if they had the option to do so. Indeed, Peru currently has one of the highest rates of out-migration in Latin America. Acting upon its newfound realization of the economic and political importance of Peruvian migrants abroad, the Peruvian state has recently created several policy initiatives to include Peruvians abroad in a new imagined Peruvian nation spanning the geographical borders. While such initiatives are well known and documented for other Latin American states including Mexico and Haiti, Peru deserves special attention, as it is currently negotiating new state-migrant relationships. These negotiations are also affecting citizenship practices and claims of belonging of Peruvians abroad.

The proposed issue is thus a timely and valuable contribution given its interest not only to an academic audience, but also to a number of political and activist constituencies in assessing and managing the impact of Peruvian migration on Peru’s economic, political, and social structures. The articles included in the special issue speak to the impact of transnational migration on economies and societies in the global south, and also to current debates about immigrant incorporation in the US, Europe and Asia. In sum, the proposed issue provides not only new empirical findings of Peruvian migration through in-depth case studies. It also contributes to an understanding of the relations of inequality and power that expel millions of Latin Americans from their home regions and cities and force them to migrate both internally and internationally.

Manuscripts should be no longer than 25 pages of double-spaced text in English, Spanish, or Portuguese. If possible, submit two copies along with a cover sheet and basic biographical information. With these items, we also require that the manuscript be sent on a CD-R, by e-mail, or on a floppy disk if the other formats are not available. The LAP style guide is available on request or online.

Please send any manuscript submissions to:

Managing Editor, Latin American Perspectives¸ P.O. Box 5703, Riverside, California 92517-5703

Use the Search Function at the Top to Find More Articles, Fellowships, Conferences, Indigenous Issues, Book Reviews, and Resources

December 10-16, 2008: Five Key Indigenous Peoples Issues

Five Important Indigenous People's Issues for the Week of December 10 - 16, 2008


Nigeria: Death, Tears, Blood as Days of Rage Envelop Jos

For two days, Jos, the capital of Plateau State, boiled with rage. Like the crisis that erupted in September 7, 2001, the November 29 conflagration that rendered the once peaceful city impotent was not anything different.

It first started like a normal political exercise. A local government election was conducted and the results were being awaited. Instead of the results, what the residents witnessed was burning, killing and looting. And for two days, the city laid prostrate. The result was that after the two-day mayhem, 200 people, going by official figures, lay dead, over 150 cars and an unknown number of houses were burnt to ashes. The home of peace and tourism had acquired a new epithet as thousands of people left the town in droves.

The last time a local government election was held in Jos North was in 1999. Since then, attempts by successive administrations to hold a local government election in the area were frustrated. Former Governor Joshua Dariye avoided the pitfalls of Jos North politics by appointing sole administrators in the area. Reasons given by the dramatis personae in the recent mayhem are varied. While the Hausa/Fulani claimed that the indigenous people were the aggressors, the indigenous people said the Hausa/Fulani were the cause of the crisis. Read more about Nigeria and Jos here....


Philippines: Indigenous Peoples Groups Ask Church Help in Fight for Their Rights

Indigenous people (IP) groups sought the help of the Catholic Church in fighting for their dignity, self-determination and the preservation and conservation of their ancestral lands.

The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines website said the Kalipunan ng Katutubong Mamamayan ng Pilipinas made the latest such appeal.

"We have become squatters in our own lands. Our communities continue to be militarized, and our brave brothers and sisters, harassed and summarily killed by State armed forces. Our sacred culture is commercialized. We fall prey to unwarranted discrimination. We are denied or neglected of the State's basic services," KAMP spokesman Himpad Mangumalas lamented.

He said indigenous peoples in the Philippines are at "war" to fight for their lands and the recognition for their inalienable rights to self-determination as a people.

Also, he said IPs’ lands are being pillaged with mining and logging of multinational companies, and the aggressive construction of dams on their domains.

Even their culture has not been spared because of commercialization, he said.

He noted one proof of state harassment against the tribal peoples in the Philippines was the case of the missing Kankanaey-Ibaloi tribe leader James Balao.

Balao disappeared last September 17, even as several residents suspect the military was behind the incident. Read more about indigenous rights in the Philippines here....


Colombia: Indigenous Populations March for Growing Rights Infringements

Thousands of indigenous Colombians marched in October and November, a protest hike of more than 500 kilometers from a southwestern corner of the country to Bogota, to call attention to generations of rights abuses against indigenous Colombians.

Protesters said these centuries of rights abuses has not eased in modern times and have even worsened under the government of President Álvaro Uribe.

“Since Uribe came to power, 1,253 indigenous have been killed, and we have 18 groups that are disappearing, among them the Juhup, Yari, Yamalero and Nukak people,” said Sen. Jesús Piñacué, a lawmaker for the Cauca department and a member of the Paez ethnicity, citing figures from the National Indigenous Organization of Colombia, or ONIC.

The indigenous marches again highlighted the land problem that ethnic Colombians are living with, an issue that was “maliciously handled by Uribe,” according to Piñacué.

On Oct. 18, Uribe said in a Communal Government Council — joint meetings with community authorities — that the Colombia´s indigenous population, which comprises just over 2 percent of the national population of 44 million people, has 27 percent of the country´s land. Read more about indigenous issues in Colombia here....


Brazil: CAFOD Delighted Court Rules to Protect Indigenous Brazilian's Land

CAFOD has welcomed a ruling by Brazil's Supreme Court to uphold the rights of indigenous people to remain on their ancestral land. The decision was made last night - a momentous day for such a positive outcome as yesterday marked the 20th anniversary of the Brazilian Constitution and the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

For decades, five indigenous peoples have called on the Brazilian government to protect their land, Raposa Serra do Sol, in the state of Roraima, in the north of the country.

The Brazilian President, Luiz Incio Lula da Silva, officially recognized the land as belonging to the Macuxi, Ingaric, Taurepang, Patamona and Wapichana groups in 2005 - but powerful farmers, who occupy a significant part of it, refused to leave the area.

The indigenous communities have been subjected to violence and intimidation from famers for many years, and tensions have increased in recent months.

More than 2,000 CAFOD supporters signed a petition to protect the indigenous communities' land following a visit to the UK by Jacir Jose de Souza and Pierlangela Nascimento da Cunha, in June.

Jacir and Pierlangela, who are from the Makuxi and Wapichana groups, toured Europe in a bid to gain international support for their campaign to save their Amazon forest home, and met the Holy Father at the Vatican. Read more about Brazil's ruling and CAFOD here....


New Zealand: PMA - Indigenous Rights Petition to Parliament

The first signatures on the national petition calling on the government to support the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples will be presented to parliament at 1pm on Human Rights Day - Wednesday, 10 December.

Human Rights Day this year marks the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the first global statement expressing the inherent dignity and equality of all human beings. The theme of the year-long UN celebrations to mark the anniversary is 'Dignity and justice for all of us'.

"Unfortunately the New Zealand government appears to have little commitment to dignity and justice for all, as it remains one of only three governments around the world opposed to the most recent international human rights Declaration - the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples", Edwina Hughes, Peace Movement Aotearoa Coordinator, said today.

"This places NZ in a tiny minority of states that are ignoring their obligations under international law, and it makes a mockery of the government's claims to be a principled defender of human rights and a credible candidate for the UN Human Rights Council."

"We are calling on the new government to distance itself from the previous government's unprincipled position on the UN Declaration", Tracey Whare de Castro, Aotearoa Indigenous Rights Trust Trustee, added. "The Declaration sets minimum standards for the recognition and protection of the human rights of indigenous peoples around the world. What kind of message is the government sending if they continue to oppose it? That indigenous peoples cannot have the same human rights as others? Clearly that viewpoint is completely unacceptable." Read more about New Zealand and the indigenous petition here....


Last weeks Five Key Indigenous People's Issues can be found here.

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Survival International, Climate Change, and Indigenous Peoples

Representatives from indigenous tribes and nations at the recent United Nations conference on climate change in Poznan, Poland, have declared the proceedings as non-conforming to U.N. regulations. In excluding indigenous peoples voices, UN representatives have refused to recognize indigenous peoples’ rights to the environments they live in, subsist upon, and steward.

According to Survival International the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Canada acted together to delete all reference to tribal peoples’ rights in a draft agreement prepared for the conference. These are the same four countries that have refused to sign the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, as well as all having failed to ratify the International Law for Tribal Peoples, known as ILO 169.

The Poznan draft agreement sets out how an international scheme to Reduce Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) could be implemented. It had initially referred to ‘noting the rights and importance of engaging indigenous peoples’, but rights are not mentioned in the amended version.

The REDD scheme, where rich industrialized countries pay less industrialized countries to keep their forests intact, is rapidly becoming a centerpiece for global action on climate change, and is expected to form a large part of whatever agreements replace the Kyoto Protocol when it runs out in 2012.

Survival International is the only international organization supporting indigenous peoples worldwide. They were founded in 1969 after an article by Norman Lewis in the UK's Sunday Times highlighted the massacres, land thefts and genocide taking place in Brazilian Amazonia.

Today, as we near the 40th anniversary of Survival International’s founding, they have supporters in 82 countries. Working for indigenous peoples' rights in three complementary ways - education, advocacy and campaigns - Survival International is a leading organization working to make sure such draft agreements as REDD do not pass public opinion.

As I believe, and as Survival International states, public opinion is the most effective force for change. Its power will make it harder, and eventually impossible, for governments and companies to continue to oppress indigenous peoples and exclude them from such talks.

Survival International provides a platform for indigenous representatives to talk directly to the companies which are invading their land. They also disseminate information to indigenous peoples, using both community radio and writing which informs them about how other indigenous peoples are faring, as well as warning them about the threats posed by various corporations.

Survival International also runs worldwide campaigns to fight for indigenous peoples. They were the first to use mass letter-writing, and have orchestrated campaigns from Siberia to Sarawak, Canada to Kenya. Today they are leading the fight in making sure indigenous peoples voices are heard at such forums as the UN. Although Poznan is over, because of organizations such as Survival International there is still hope for indigenous peoples.

Since the ending of the 20th Century, the “developed” world’s attitude to indigenous peoples has dramatically changed. Then, it was assumed that they would either die out or be assimilated; now, at least in some places, their experience and values are considered important. For the past 40 years Survival International has pushed indigenous issues into the political and cultural mainstream, and it is important that they continue to do so for the next 40 years.

Please visit Survival International to learn more and to help.

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Ethnomusicology of North Africa: Seeking Authors for New Book

Currently seeking previously unpublished essays for new book on the musical cultures, modern/historical musical traditions, and instrumentation for the countries of: Western Sahara, Mauritania, Mali, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, Libya, Chad, Niger, Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, and Egypt. Open to students, ethnomusicologists, historians, anthropologists, sociologists, and Africanists with an expertise in Saharan ethnomusicology. Book will also include instrument glossary and notable recordings (CDs/LPs) by country.


Please send essays on ANY aspect of musical traditions of this region. They may be on a specific artist, musical genre, instrument, or include performance, aesthetics, modernity, diaspora, media, or folklore elements. They may be written from individual field research, a dissertation/thesis, college paper, journal-caliber articles, or written especially for this book. Remember, the papers should be UNPUBLISHED and currently NOT being considered for publishing elsewhere.

No deadline for submissions, but I would consider papers through 2009. No honoraria at this time. No page limits. Send articles by email in Word or pdf formats only.

Matthew J. Forss
Editor
Email: worldmusicman2002 @ yahoo.com (no spaces)

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December 3-9, 2008: Five Key Indigenous Peoples Issues

Five Important Indigenous People's Issues for the Week of December 3 - 9, 2008


South America: Uncontacted Tribes Said To Face Genocide

On the day established to remember early relations between North American colonists and Native Americans, indigenous rights groups are amplifying their efforts to protect the very last tribes who remain untouched by colonial influences.

An official in the Brazilian government said late last week that rare Amazonian tribes that have evaded "civilization" thus far could soon be wiped out by illegal ranchers and loggers.

Under most immediate threat is the Piripkura, a tribe with an unknown population that lives in Brazil's northwestern Amazon. Members of the tribe are thought to survive by hunting with wooden sticks and a knife they found in the jungle.

If illegal ranching and logging in their area continues, the tribe will face "genocide," Jose Meirelles, a researcher with Brazil's Indian Affairs agency, stated in a press release put out by Survival International last week.

Survival, which is one of the oldest organizations working to support indigenous people, says loggers have intentionally blocked the Piripkura's trails to drive them off their land. Loss of land can mean death for hunter-gatherer tribes like the Piripkura, and forced contact with outsiders often leads to the spread of deadly illnesses to which they have no immunity.

Logging can also cause conflicts between tribes over scarcer resources, according to Beatriz Huertas, an official with the international indigenous rights group CIPIACI, who was quoted by Reuters last month. Read more about uncontacted indigenous tribes here....


Paraguay: Uncontacted Ayoreo Threatened By Deforestation

Large swathes of native forest have been turned into pasture land in the northern part of Paraguay’s semi-arid Chaco region, as large Brazilian cattle ranchers expand their property in this country.

The ranchers and landowning companies are encroaching on the territory of the Ayoreo-Totobiegosode Indians, and the destruction of forests is threatening the natural and cultural heritage of the nomadic indigenous group, some of whom still live in voluntary isolation in the forest.

"Our situation is very worrisome, because we still have relatives who do not want to be in contact with white society," Porai Picanerai, a leader of the Payipie Ichadie Totobiegosode Organisation (OPIT -- New Totobiegosode Thinking), told IPS.

The Totobiegosode form part of the larger Ayoreo ethnic group.

In early November, there were reports that some uncontacted members of the group had been seen in a deforested area that belongs to Brazilian landowners, on the edge of the indigenous group’s protected territory.

Until December 1986, Picanerai was living in the bush in the northern department (province) of Alto Paraguay, which is part of the Chaco region -- a vast area of dense, scrubby forest that covers western Paraguay and parts of Bolivia and Argentina. Read more about the Ayoreo here....


Nigeria: Aid Agencies Struggle To Cope After Jos Carnage

Aid workers say they are struggling to cope with the fallout of violent clashes between Christians and Muslims in Nigeria’s central city of Jos, in Plateau state, which killed and wounded hundreds of people and displaced some 10,000.

Preliminary police figures show that some 200 people died in the violence, triggered by local election results, but the number is thought to be higher.

Health workers fear infection from dead bodies still strewn about the city, and say they can barely cope with the injured.

Up to 10,000 residents of Jos North, the scene of the violence, have sought refuge in local mosques, churches, and army and police barracks, according to Nigerian Red Cross director in Jos Dan Tom.

The Red Cross is giving medical help to the injured in camps and in the three local hospitals, which, Ishaya Pam, chief medical director of Jos University Teaching Hospital, said are “seriously over-stretched.” He said: “We are short of medical supplies, and we don’t even have enough food to give patients because there are so many of them.”

The Nigerian Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has been handing out blankets, buckets, kettles, food and water to displaced families but Francis Ayinzat, programme coordinator with the NGO Oxfam in Jos, said: “In one [army] barrack 2,000 people are sleeping on the floor with no basic facilities. Most of the shops are closed and the price of food is increasing dramatically.” Read more about Nigeria and indigenous peoples here....


Puerto Rico: Tradition Counts More Than Beauty At A Pageant

The seven girls posed, preened and smiled with all the energy of Miss Universe contestants, but this was no ordinary pageant.

The competitors, from about 6-years-old to 16, had just paraded through a downpour to a small stage surrounded by mountains, where they displayed elaborate outfits handmade from wood, plants or, in one case, jingling shells. And the judges also sought a special kind of beauty: those who most resembled Puerto Rico’s native Indian tribe, the Taíno, received higher marks.

“It’s different,” said Félix González, president of the National Indigenous Festival of Jayuya, of which the pageant is a part. “It’s not white culture and blue eyes; it says that the part of our blood that comes from indigenous culture is just as important.”

Puerto Ricans have long considered themselves a mix of African, European and Native American influences. But since the 1960s, the Taíno — a tribe wiped from the Antilles by European conquest, disease and assimilation — has come to occupy a special place in the island’s cultural hierarchy.

The streets of Old San Juan are lined with museums and research centers dedicated to unearthing Taíno artifacts and rituals. Children are taught from a young age that “hurricane” is Taíno in origin, from the word “huracán,” while no Latin pop music concert is complete without a shout out to Boricuas — those from Borinquen, the Taíno name for Puerto Rico, which means “land of the brave noble lord.” Read more about indigenous Taino in Puerto Rico here....


Australia: Dodson's Outstation Review To Exclude Aboriginal Communities

ABORIGINES who live in the most remote parts of the Northern Territory are to be excluded from an inquiry into their very existence.

Territory consultant and Aboriginal leader Patrick Dodson yesterday conceded he would spend the next two weeks conducting public hearings on the future of remote outstations -- without visiting any of them.

The Territory Government is formulating a policy on the future of about 500 outstations, following an agreement last year that it would take over responsibility for the settlements from the federal Government.

Under that agreement, the commonwealth will hand over $20million a year over three years to provide municipal and essential services such as water, electricity and sewerage, as well as infrastructure. Mr Dodson described the amount as "very minimal".

Mr Dodson began the first round of consultations in Darwin yesterday. He will visit 17 towns and communities but said it was a "clear fault in the process" that government representatives were not visiting any outstation communities and that no interpreting services in Aboriginal languages had been arranged.

There was anger yesterday from within communities.

Jackie Nguluwidi, an indigenous leader at the homeland of Mapuru, in northeast Arnhem Land adjacent to Elcho Island, said indigenous people from the homelands felt highly uncomfortable discussing the plight of their community on another community's land. Read more about Australian Aboriginals in the Northern Territory here....


Last weeks Five Key Indigenous People's Issues can be found here.

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The Development of Social Science Theory, Archaeology, and Indigenous Peoples

The social sciences have experienced a number of rapid and expansive theoretical developments over the course of the last hundred years. From fighting for their existence as an intellectual endeavor within academia and the university during the 19th century, to experiencing a series of popular and wide scale adoptions with such theoretical epistemologies as positivism and behaviorism, the social sciences are currently at an epistemological crossroads. In the aftermath of such powerful critiques as deconstructionism, postmodernism, postcolonialism, and the Frankfurt School’s singular attack on positivism and the Vienna School, the social sciences are struggling to find their epistemological footing. This is particularly true within the field of anthropology, including its daughter discipline of archaeology, for not only has the theoretical foundations of the discipline been called into question, but the field’s subject matter – its source of data and existence – has also been brought to bear. In an effort to reestablish some form of theoretical footing, the social sciences have begun to open their epistemological doors to cultures and ways of knowing historically allowed to only represent data. In this process, indigenous peoples and their epistemology have played a key role.

Over the past two decades a significant amount of academic energy has been invested in professing the urgent need and essentialness for developing what some have called an indigenous archaeology. Books, essays, and academic conferences have discussed, defined, and designed a multiplicity of paths towards this goal. Very little effort has been expanded, however, in seriously examining the intellectual viability or the social and cultural desirability of this project. In a recent paper entitled Aboriginalism and the Problems of Indigenous Archaeology Robert McGhee attempts to examine this theoretical endeavor within the field of archaeology.

Read more about Aboriginalism, indigenous archaeology, and the development of social science theory here.

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American Indian and Indigenous People's Conferences: Call for Papers

Call for Papers: American Indian/Indigenous Film Area

Southwest/Texas Popular & American Culture Associations 30th Anniversary Conference, Albuquerque, NM

February 24-28, 2009

The 2009 WS/TX PCA/ACA Conference will be held in Albuquerque, New Mexico at the Hyatt Regency downtown.

The American Indian/Indigenous Film Area is looking for panels, papers, and workshops on topics related to American Indian, First Nations, and Indigenous film. We welcome proposals from all disciplines that examine, utilize, promote, or teach Native/Indigenous film and media are welcome. The American Indian/Indigenous Film Area is particularly interested in bringing together Native filmmakers and Native/non-Native academics to talk about the burgeoning field of Indigenous Film.

Some topics might include, but are not limited to:

• Native women filmmakers.
• American Indian/Indigenous Film and/or filmmakers.
• New Voices in Native/Indigenous film and media.
• Needs, Access, and Issues in Native/Indigenous film.
• The outcomes/consequences of using Native films across cultural boundaries and in comparison to other cultural approaches.
• Teaching American Indian or Indigenous films as part of a non-American Indian Studies course, such as Humanities, American Studies, or English.
• Disciplinary and cultural politics as they influence how we read Native film.
• American Indians in Hollywood film.
• Approaches to teaching American Indian film.
• Indian and the Western (this could also apply to how Indigenous people globally are positioned as “Indians” in national “Western” genres).
• Effects/impacts of Native representations in film/media on Native and non-Native culture.
• Showcasing new work (if you would like to facilitate a panel that screens new work, please do so).

If you have specific ideas for topics, workshops, or panels that are not listed here, please submit those as well.

Native filmmakers, scholars, teachers, students, professionals, and others are encouraged to participate. Graduate students may wish to submit papers for fellowships and awards. Further information regarding the conference (listing of all areas, hotel, registration, tours, etc) can be found at http://swtxpca.org/documents/130.html. Register early for a discount rate and to reserve space at the conference hotel—rooms fill quickly.

Date and Place: February 24-28, 2009

Hyatt Regency Albuquerque
30 Tijeras
Albuquerque, NM 87102
Phone: 1.505.842.1234
Fax: 1.515.766.6710

Please pass along this call to friends and colleagues.

Deadlines: Priority Submission and Registration: December 1, 2008 Final deadline for Proposals and Panels: Decenber 15, 2008 Final Conference Registration: December 31, 2008 (All participants must be registered by this date).

Please send 100-200 word abstracts to:

M. Elise Marubbio,
Assistant Professor & Director Augsburg Native American Film Series CB 115 Augsburg College
2211 Riverside Avenue
Minneapolis, MN 55454
(612) 330-1523
marubbio@augsburg.edu


Call for Papers: American Indians Today

Abstract/Proposals by 15 December 2008 (Deadline Extension) February 25-28, 2009

Southwest/Texas Popular & American Popular Culture Associations 30th Annual Conference

Albuquerque, NM. February 25-28, 2009
Hyatt Regency Albuquerque
330 Tijeras
Albuquerque, NM 87102
Phone: 1.505.842.1234
Fax: 1.505.766.6710

Panels now forming on topics related to American Indians Today. I am looking for panels or papers that examine the influence that American pop culture has on aspects of contemporary American Indian life ways and vice versa.

American Indian culture is diverse and an examination of the culture, influences, adaptation, and cultural syncretism as it is presented in contemporary America is welcome.

Proposals may examine any aspect of American Indian life ways and pop culture as represented or interpreted in: the arts and performing arts (storytelling, myth, legend, theater, music); poetry; oral tradition; myth; legend; philosophy; sciences, arts; fashion; artifacts; foods; journalism; media (radio, television); photography; cultural, spiritual or identity appropriation; stereotypes; mascots; tribal politics; history; gaming; Indians in the military; activist movements; social influences; reservation, rural and urban influences; languages; assimilation, adaptation, and syncretism; sovereignty, peoplehood and any influence one may observe that has its genesis in American popular culture as adapted by contemporary American Indians.

This year marks our milestone 30th Anniversary! We will mark this accomplishment with our conference theme that celebrates our roots, "Reeling in the Years: 30 Years of Film, TV, and Popular Culture." For this special theme, papers are particularly sought on aspects of film, TV, and popular culture of the last 30 years with an emphasis on the popular culture of 1979.

We are honored to have as our Luncheon Keynote, former New Mexico Governor David Cargo (1967-1971). Among his many accomplishments, Governor Cargo founded the New Mexico Film Commission, the first of its kind nationwide, which brought Hollywood film production to New Mexico. Continuing a tradition of governors who act, David Cargo played roles in several films including The Gatling Gun (1973), Bunny O'Hare (1971), and Up in the Cellar (1971) about a student poet who seduces his college president's wife, daughter, and girlfriend over lost financial aid.

Priority Submission and Registration: December 1, 2008.

Final Submission Deadline: Dec. 15, 2008.

Conference Registration: Dec. 31, 2008 (all participants must be registered by this date!).

Send abstracts and proposals for panels of 100-250 words. Submissions may be directed to me at the address below by 15 December 2008. :

Richard L. Allen, Area Chair
American Indians Today
Cherokee Nation
P.O. Box 948
Tahlequah, Oklahoma 74465
(918) 453- 5466
Email: rallen@cherokee.org

Details regarding the conference (listing of all areas, hotel registration) can be found at http://swtxpca.org/documents/home.html

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November 26-December 2, 2008: Five Key Indigenous Peoples Issues

Five Important Indigenous People's Issues for the Week of November 26 - December 2, 2008

Ecuador: Mass Indigenous Protest In Defense Of Water Caps Week Of Mobilizations In Ecuador

Over 10,000 indigenous people from hundreds of Ecuador's Northern Sierra (highlands) communities gathered to present the native movement's proposed Water Law. Protesters chanted, "Water is not for sale, it is to be defended," as speakers excoriated President Rafael Correa's draft Water Law, saying that it could lead to privatization and pollution by mining companies.

The protest was organized by the Confederation of Peoples of the Kichwa Nationality (Ecuaranari), the Sierra regional block of the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE). Marches left from the North, South and West to converge on the Pan-American Highway, blocking the country's central artery for over six hours.

The march also showed the indigenous movement's capacity to mobilize large numbers of people, a sign that the CONAIE is recovering from past internal divisions and political defeats. Correa has regularly insulted indigenous leaders and anti-mining activists, claiming that they do not represent a real political base. But indigenous people at Wednesday's protest were passionate about defending their access to clean water.

Maria came to the march from the community of Santa Anita, in the Central Sierra province of Chimborazo: "We are here to defend the water. We take care of the páramos (Andean wetlands) to get our water. We don't get our water for free. They say they're going to take away our water, and we're not going to let them."

The protest came two days after thousands of campesinos and coastal fishers staged nationwide protests and road blockades against Correa's draft Mining Law and support for large-scale shrimp farms. Activists contend that the law would allow companies to undertake damaging large-scale and open pit mining in ecologically sensitive areas, contaminating the water supply with heavy metals. Fishers demanded that Correa overturn Decree 1391, passed on October 15th, which handed thousands of marine hectares over to large-scale shrimp farmers. This will lead to the further destruction of mangrove forests, critical habitat for the area's fish, crabs and conchs. Participants in all of this week's marches have emphasized the importance of natural resources to their communities. Read more about indigenous protests in Ecuador here....


Latin America: Indigenous And Latin American Leaders Optimistic About Obama

Latin American reaction to the presidential election victory of Barack Obama has been overwhelmingly positive. Indigenous leaders as well as presidents of countries with activist native communities sent notes of congratulations to the president elect; they have also expressed optimism for improved relations between Latin America and the U.S.

For Bolivian President Evo Morales, whose historic victory as an indigenous man winning the presidency in a country with a long and violently racist past, the Obama victory was a “historic triumph.”

“… on behalf of the national government, congratulations,” President Morales said at a press conference Nov. 5. “He [Obama] is a man who comes from one of the sectors most discriminated against, from people who were enslaved; it is historic certainly.

“I am sure he will continue to make history,” Morales continued. “I am also sure that the relations between the Bolivian and U.S. governments will improve.”

The Aymaran leader repeated his assertion that “… who could have been better, … a person who represents the most marginalized people, the African Americans.” President Morales went on to encourage the president-elect to lift the blockade against Cuba (as would the presidents of Brazil, Ecuador and Venezuela) and to retire U.S. troops from “… some countries.” Read more about Obama and Latin American perspectives here....


Africa: Mobile Finance: Indigenous, Ingenious Or Both?

In Ghana, it's popularly known as susu. In Cameroon, tontines or chilembe. And in South Africa, stokfel. Today, you'd most likely call it plain-old microfinance, the nearest term we have for it. Age-old indigenous credit schemes have run perfectly well without much outside intervention for generations. Although, in our excitement to implement new technologies and solutions, we sometimes fail to recognize them. Innovations such as mobile banking -- great as they may be -- are hailed as revolutionary without much consideration for what may have come before or who the original innovators may have been.

The image of traditional African societies as predominantly "simple hunter-gatherer" is more myth than truth. The belief that Africa had little by way of economic institutions and processes before the arrival of the Europeans is another. As Niti Bhan pointed out during her fascinating "Life is Hard" presentation at the Better World By Design Conference earlier this month, many rural communities today are familiar with concepts such as loans, barter, swap, trade, credit and interest rates, yet the majority remain excluded from the mainstream modern banking system and have never heard of things like ATMs, banks, mortgages or credit cards. It's not that people don't understand banking concepts; it's just that, for them, things go by a different name.

In Kenya, as few as one in 10 people may have a bank account, but that doesn't stop many of them from using a number of trading instruments or running successful businesses. Technology can certainly help strengthen traditional trading practices, and we know this because when technology is made available, the users are often the first to figure out how to best make it work for them. Mobile technology is today showcasing African grassroots innovation at its finest. Read more about indigenous economics in Africa here....


Canada: A World Leader – In Inuit Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis rates among Inuit in Canada may be 90 times higher than in Canada overall, Dr. David Butler-Jones, head of the Public Health Agency of Canada, told delegates to an international gathering in Toronto last week on tuberculosis and indigenous peoples.

Those rates are among the highest in the world in places where reliable statistics are available. Butler-Jones said poverty and overcrowded housing are mainly to blame.

"We have a tragic history when it comes to tuberculosis, and unfortunately for many Inuit communities, it continues to be today's reality," national Inuit leader Mary Simon said on the eve of the international forum.

The Toronto meeting, sponsored by Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami and the Assembly of First Nations, brought together representatives of indigenous organizations from over 60 countries.

Around the world, indigenous people suffer from much higher rates of tuberculosis than other populations, Gail Turner, director of health services for Nunatsiavut in Labrador, said after attending the global gathering.

It may be even higher among the Masai of Africa, or in indigenous groups in the Himalayas than among the Inuit, Turner said, but accurate statistics are not available for those areas. Read more about Inuit tuberculosis in Canada here....


Philippines: Bukidnon Tribe's Children Get Another Chance To Go Back To School

Argielyn clutched the strap of her backpack containing notebooks, pens and other school supplies. Her groomed hair matched her spanking black shoes and lily-white socks as she entered the Bukidnon National High School here. She beamed as she joined the sea of students who rushed inside the gate as the school bell rang to announce the start of classes for the day.

This was not Argielyn’s routine during school days a few years back. Her world was confined to their shanty where she would do house chores and attend to her younger siblings while her parents worked in their farm. Dire poverty forced her parents, both belonging to the Bukidnon tribe in barangay Dalwangan here, to stop sending her to school after she had finished grade four. She thought she would not get another chance to continue her studies and had resigned to the thought of following her parents’ fate of marrying early and spending the rest of her life in their secluded village near the forest.

Argielyn’s story is common among children of the Bukidnon tribe, many of whom rarely get to finish grade six. Those who manage to complete the elementary level – and only a few of them do – find it harder to enter high school much less college. Luckily for Argielyn and some others like her, a non-government organization has been able to generate assistance for their studies. Since 2006, the Kitanglad Integrated NGOs has received modest amounts and school supplies from individuals, private institutions as well as, from the city government of Malaybalay for this purpose. Read more about the Bukidnon tribe and school here....

Last weeks Five Key Indigenous People's Issues can be found here.

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HIV/AIDS and Indigenous People in Africa: A Continuing Health Problem

This post is in support of World Aids Day - December 1, 2008.

In the latest issue of Practicing Anthropology, Gisele Maynard-Tucker and Alexander Rodlach bring together panel papers focusing on HIV/AIDS in Africa, which were presented at the 67th Annual Meeting of the Society for Applied Anthropology. These papers discuss various topics related to HIV/AIDS in different African countries: the association between gender and HIV infections; the consequences for the epidemic of the shortage of health workers; the importance of ethical considerations in developing protocols for HIV/AIDS interventions; local interpretations of, and reactions to, methods preventing new HIV infections; and the impact of resource insecurities on HIV/AIDS programs.

HIV/AIDS was first identified in the early 1980s, and since that time substantial progress has been made regarding understanding the disease. For example, there has been increasing awareness of social and cultural patterns that either exacerbate or diminish the epidemic. Likewise, researchers have sought strategies for preventing new HIV infections and developed treatment and care programs for those suffering from AIDS, despite shortages of funding for such programs. Similarly, great efforts have been made to prevent new infections, to treat those already infected, and to support those affected by AIDS. Nevertheless, as Gisele and Alexander point out, the high number of individuals becoming infected annually, the costs preventing access to antiretroviral drugs for many, along with the difficulty of creating culturally appropriate AIDS programs mitigates against our complacency.

Contained within this edited edition, Susan Fields Mead concludes that despite the progress seen in the post-industrialized world, HIV continues to threaten the viability of indigenous populations in other parts of the world. For the indigenous populations along the Ghana-Togo border, its threat is felt most acutely by the indigenous women who put their health at risk to achieve a certain level of economic and social security. Susan argues that many indigenous women assume protection from HIV through marriage and other purportedly monogamous relationships, but who then consequently engage in unprotected sex and potentially become infected. The growing prevalence of this virus among indigenous women in the border communities requires special attention from the government, traditional leaders, and aid organizations.

Likewise, Joyce V. Millen notes that anthropologists are well equipped to elicit explanatory models and local interpretations that can be used to work collaboratively with indigenous African colleagues who seek research assistance in exploring the relative effectiveness of new policies aimed to train and retain health workers.

Sharon Watson Lai, Regina Mpemi, Nancy Romero-Daza, David Himmelgreen, and Ipolto Okello-Uma argue that in order to deal with the mismatch in addressing western human subjects’ protection, donor priorities and community concerns, a space must be created in the grants and projects section of the field that includes a collaborative process. Collaborative planning does not lend itself easily to institutional budgets and timelines, but it is essential for the success of prevention programs. In doing so, they note that engaging with the local indigenous communities in the formulation of research in interventions, the principles of autonomy, beneficence, and justice can be incorporated.

Finally, Gisele Maynard-Tucker rightly argues that governments need to establish a stabilization fund by imposing specific health taxes on international companies exploiting local indigenous resources. For instance, she argues that companies could be asked to pay an HIV/AIDS Tax on income earned in a country, and that those funds would then be levied to pay for upgrading health care systems and in providing prevention, treatment, and care for indigenous AIDS patients.

Together, the papers presented in the Practicing Anthropology issue contribute to strengthening prevention and care efforts of indigenous peoples in Africa effected by HIV/AIDS.

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November 19-25, 2008: Five Key Indigenous Peoples Issues

Five Important Indigenous People's Issues for the Week of November 19 - November 25, 2008

Nigeria: Ogoni and Quest for Autonomy

Roland Ogbonnaya puts the various Ogoni crises in perspective, looking at efforts made in the past by the people and various governments to address the problems. Investigations however show that the Ogoni issue illustrate the interplay of politics, economics, and ethnicity within a context increasingly shaped both by access to international media and by human rights concepts.

The Ogoni struggle has its roots in the Nigerian Civil War of 1967-70. Many non-Igbos who were coerced to join the defunct Biafra felt oppressed by Igbos, as well as by Nigerians. This was especially true for the Ogoni after their homeland was taken over by Nigerian forces in 1968 and thousands were forcibly moved into Igboland by Biafran authorities. At the end of the war, the Ogoni formed a "supreme cultural organisation" called KAGOTE, which was created by an elite group of traditional leaders. KAGOTE was a non-political organisation that gave rise to MOSOP (Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People), which was formed to address the economic and environmental conditions of Ogoni. MOSOP was led by political elite capable of articulating commonly-held perceptions of oppression. The nature of that oppression has changed over time, as the impact of exploitation developed and intensified.

Ogoni economic and environmental complaints have focused on Shell and Nigeria's military government. Shell has not endeared itself to people of the Niger River Delta who suffer environmental degradation, but do not enjoy either jobs or improvement in living conditions. MOSOP claimed Shell has taken $30 billion from Ogoniland since 1958. A cursory look "shows an immeasurable level of poverty, squalor, underdevelopment and complete absence of basic social amenities such as electricity, pipe-borne water, hospitals, roads, and recreational facilities.”

According to a MOSOP publication: “In the 35 years, Shell (has) operated with such total disregard of the environment that the Ogoni people have come to the conclusion that the company is waging an ecological war on them . . . The response of Shell has been to appeal to the rulers of Nigeria for whom oil means a lot of money in private pockets and in the public purse. Together, the two have mounted a campaign of intimidation and terrorism against the Ogoni people and its leaders.”

Because the public sector appears to reward the private interests of those who control it, persons outside the privileged and corrupt inner circles turn to kinship networks and emphasise personal ties, yielding the potential for and the reality of intense feuds across divisions of clans, indigenous identities and class strata. Thus, Ogoni complaints and demands have never been limited to the question of environmental degradation or economic deprivation of the proceeds resulting from the oil industry which is responsible for the degradation; they are much more problematic than can be explained in such simple analysis. Read more about Ogoni and Nigeria here....


United States: Barack Obama and the Native American Vote

Like millions of people all over the world, I'm ecstatic, over-the-moon inspired by Obama's win, if for no other reason than his win is actually a good thing for the people in my community. Yes indeed, the new leadership of Barack Obama in the United States of America is good for Native people, and you can sure as hell bet that a whole lot of us voted for him, and are counting on him to really care about the issues we are facing.

Like right now.

Several times last night, I heard:
"If a Black man can do it, so can we."
"We need a Native Barack Obama."
"A man of color in office is a victory for us all!"

Which were all great things to hear rather than the usual cutting each other up in stereotypes and ignorance I usually see. To me, this represented an unveiling of a layer of oppression, where you had the Indigenous peoples of this land busting ass so that a fellow marginalized person could clean house with votes within a system none of us created, to make real change that we all sorely need.

Especially if you are still being colonized, I might add.

The First Americans for Obama Campaign was a true attempt at engaging the Native Americans here to work in solidarity with Obama on our common ground issues, and get the Democratic Party to pay a little more attention to the severity of what is going on in our communities. I'll admit myself that when I first heard about it, I immediately wanted to jump on the bandwagon of actually seeing our people represented in such a public light with the star that is Obama. But now that the campaign is over, I can honestly say that it did not do a good enough job of reaching out to where we actually are, which for a high percentage of us is in rural and remote places. In addition to that important factor, I have several friends and family members who although they were Obama supporters, refused to even wear a "First American for Obama" t-shirt, because of the offensive nature of referring to us as "Americans," which of course we are not. Read more about Obama and the Native American vote here....


Philippines: Davao Villagers Battle World’s Largest Mining Company

Waves lap up the shallow shores of Sitio Wagon in Barangay (village) Macambol as fishermen and their families work and live off the bountiful waters of Pujada Bay.

The noise of the waves mixes with that of an electric plainer being used to shape the belly of a new banca – a simple fishing boat — under the shade of some coconut trees. A much bigger boat which can carry more than a ton of fish approaches the shore after having spent days, possibly even weeks at sea.

Many boats are still out and six more colorfully painted bancas lie on the sand, their fishing nets and traps left to bleach and dry out under the sun.

A sand spit away from the boat shop, Martina Baldapan is sun-drying a basket of different fish just outside her kitchen. They were caught by her son and prepared simply by being dipped in salt and water. Martina leaves them for a day before taking most of the basket to sell for PhP 80 (USD 1) a kilo. The rest she keeps for her family to eat.

Martina is just one of an estimated 3,000 people in the coastal village of Macambol who rely on Pujada Bay for a living.

Other villagers work the lands round Mt. Hamiguitan which, like the Bay has been declared a protected area. Read more about indigenous people fighting mining company here....


Mindanao: Community "Kept in the Dark" While Mine Exploration Goes Forward on Philippine Island

The land of Macambol in the island of Mindanao in the Philippines lies between two areas of rare natural beauty: the Hamiguitan Mountain range and Pujada Bay. According to the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development (CAFOD), approximately 25 percent of the 5,000 people living there are indigenous people. While average family incomes are low, most of the population is still able to make a living from their surrounding natural environment – through fishing and farming mango, coconut and root crops.

And so the fact that the Anglo-Australian mining company BHP Billiton plans to develop a nickel processing plant and operate a mine there for around 30 years is highly relevant to them.

The Philippines’ experience in mining has not been a pleasant one. For instance, the 1996 mining accident in Marinduque Island in the Phillipines – when more than four million metric tons of toxic mine waste spilled from the Marcopper mine – caused widespread flooding and damage to both people and property. According to an Oxfam Australia Mining Ombudsman Case Study in 2004, communities throughout Marinduque said that the effects of the accident were still affecting their livelihoods and health.

But such tragedies are not restricted to mining accidents. CAFOD says that mining can have long-lasting effects on communities: through social division, displacing people from their homes and lands against their will and causing irreversible loss to biodiversity. Read more about mining exploration in Mindanao here....


Canada: The Error of Taking Away First Nations' Land Has Not Yet Been Corrected

Today British Columbia is officially 150 years old. We extend sincere congratulations to the people of this province and the government of B.C. in commemorating this important anniversary. We share an incredibly beautiful and resource-rich land which has provided a livelihood for most British Columbians.

Not necessarily for B.C. first nations, however. The goodwill of the people and the political will of governments is required to address socio-economic disparities and honourably and fairly resolve the "land question."

On Nov. 19, 1858, James Douglas, governor of the colony, issued a proclamation dispossessing our peoples of our lands. Douglas called them "Indian Territories" and "wild and unoccupied." He named the colony British Columbia and paved the way to establish a government.

Three months later, on Feb. 14, 1859, he would "declare" that "all lands in British Columbia, and all the Mines and Minerals therein, belong to the Crown in fee."

Douglas's description of our territories as "wild" may have a certain poetic allure, but these lands were certainly occupied. Our "Indian Territories" were and continue to be the ancestral homelands of many different self-governing indigenous peoples and nations including Dakelh/Dene, Coast and Interior Salish, Haida, Tsimshian/Nisga'a/Gitxsan, Tlingit, Ktunaxa, Kwakiutl, Nuu Chah Nulth and so on.

None of them, or their ancestors, consented to the transfer of their lands to the Crown by way of agreement, treaty, acquiescence, conquest, warfare or otherwise. Read more about First Nations land struggles here....

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