SWIFT FOUNDATION AND FIRST NATIONS DEVELOPMENT INSTITUTE WEBINAR SERIES ON UNPACKING JARGON

The overarching goal of this webinar series is a search for clarity and the use of appropriate language to ensure respectful and positive relationships with indigenous peoples and marginalized groups, and to interrogate terms that may be discriminatory, offensive or the undergird strategies that perpetuate white supremacy, assimilation and/or displacement. It is also an invitation to the philanthropic community to explore the nature, scope and extent of societal issues by discussing the interrelationship of problems, policies and politics through the language we use. It is a proposition to think differently, to unpack concepts before we pursue ideas further and expand our comprehension of common words whose meaning may well include and perpetuate unexamined notions.

This is part of an ongoing webinar series on “Unpacking Jargon.” For a link to the recording of Unpacking Jargon #1 please see here.

SWIFT FOUNDATION AND FIRST NATIONS DEVELOPMENT INSTITUTE PRESENTS UNPACKING JARGON #2: CONSERVATION, PROTECTED AREAS AND INDIGENOUS HOMELANDS PART 1: VOICES FROM TURTLE ISLAND/NORTH AMERICA

March 10, 2022
10:00am – 11:30am PST

Register for the webinar here

DESCRIPTION

Conservation is a word that is also an industry that has grown in scale and influence. Protected Areas are a method of conservation that also have a problematic track record of forcibly removing indigenous and other marginalized groups from their homelands, tied to fortress conservation. Indigenous homelands are known to be the most well protected, culturally and biologically diverse places remaining on the planet. And yet, the word ‘conservation’ does not exist in Indigenous languages. “Indigenous conservation,” for instance, is an oxymoron that does not suffice to describe the complex management practices, that are also agricultural and spiritual, within Indigenous territoralities. The goal of this conversation is to unpack meanings and memories associated with these words in order to deepen a shared understanding toward strengthening more coherent efforts and narratives grounded in reciprocity of the land and community.

Protecting homelands – whether watersheds, estuaries and coral reefs, or prairie, pampas and old growth forests – is essential to maintaining life. This is not an invention of the conservation Industry. This is how indigenous people have been living for millennia through maize farming, berry harvesting, salmon fishing, elk hunting, fire management, reindeer herding, etc. The challenge with the word “conservation” is therefore not in the simple objective of land preservation, it is in the prevalent and well-funded top down construction that has promoted an idea of people and nature as separate. This notion comes from a Euro-American construct that justified land theft through colonization. To this day global non governmental environmental organizations are funded far more generously than the many grassroots and indigenous organizations proven to be far more reliable and accountable to the people and places they serve.

This webinar will discuss and reflect on the ways the terms conservation and protected areas have been in conflict with practices of maintaining Indigenous people’s homelands and how philanthropy might reconsider these terms and consider Indigenous words and understandings instead or alongside. We will also consider what “conservation” and “protected” territories looks like when led by people inhabiting and caring for their own homelands, that which might be called conservation but for which there are other words. Alternatives to the 30×30, such as the 80% of the Amazon protected by 2025 promoted by Indigenous Peoples organizations and allies, will be also discussed.

Read more about Swift Foundation: https://www.swiftfoundation.org

Read more about First Nations Development Institute: https://www.firstnations.org/

For more information, contact Rosemary Hitchens: rosemary@assistswiftfoundation.org

SPEAKERS:

1. Opening by Mary Adelzadeh, Program Advisor, First Nations Development Institute
2. Eddie Knight, Coyote Valley Tribal member: Coyote Valley Historic Preservation officer and organizer of the Blues Beach land transfer.
3. Jeannette Armstrong, Syilx Okanagan, a fluent speaker of Nsyilxcn and a traditional knowledge keeper of the Okanagan Nation: Canada Research Chair in Okanagan Indigenous Knowledge and Philosophy.
4. Marlowe Sam, Wenatchi/Lakes descendent from the Colville Confederated Tribes of Washington State (CCT): Lecturer, Indigenous Studies, University of British Colombia Okanagan campus.
5. Closing by Alejandro Alejandro, Program Director and Andes Amazon Lead, Swift Foundation.
6. Moderated by Sonja Swift, Program Advisor, Swift Foundation