Post your links and snippets of news in the comment section.
UPDATE: Oke was unable to post our news diary yesterday so we will keep this diary open to collect links for next week, April 25th.
Post your links and snippets of news in the comment section.
UPDATE: Oke was unable to post our news diary yesterday so we will keep this diary open to collect links for next week, April 25th.
From RL Miller:
[emphasis mine]
Canada’s First Nations Take Legal Stand on Oil Sands
Date: 04/14/2010
The Supreme Court of Canada has taken a positive step for First Nations in a case that may have major legal implications for the development of oil sands, pipelines, and other projects in the province of Alberta. The court granted intervenor status to Duncan’s First Nation and Horse Lake First Nation. This “standing” allows the nations to pursue their case before the court, where otherwise, they wouldn’t be allowed to appeal at all. The First Nations turned to the court because of their increasing frustration over the government’s refusal to act on earlier court decisions that direct governments to deal with Indigenous rights.
Duncan’s First Nation Chief Don Testawich stated, “Our traditional territory is being overrun and cut to pieces by oil sands, major pipelines, gas fields and major power projects. Development on this scale will is making our Treaty Rights meaningless and threatens our traditional way of life… The governments of Alberta and Canada sit back and refuse to address our concerns. We are intervening before the Supreme Court because it is abundantly clear that neither the environment nor First Nations can expect to receive a fair hearing within Alberta, where oil sands revenues are at stake. We need help now and help fast”.
This summer, the Supreme Court will hear conflicting arguments and views of First Nations, governments and industry in the Rio Tinto Alcan Inc. v. the Carrier Sekani Tribal Council case. The case will address the question of whether regulatory boards have a duty to decide whether Canada adequately consulted and accommodated First Nations’ concerns before granting approvals for resource development, including concerns about past infringements of Aboriginal and Treaty rights.
The two nations want the Court to direct governments and regulators to fully and effectively address the consultation rights of First Nations in the regulatory processes for the major oil sands and tar sands infrastructure projects being proposed by Royal Dutch Shell, Trans Canada Pipelines, Enbridge, Bruce Nuclear Power and other corporations.
For more information visit:
Boston International Film Festival Features Film on Native Languages
CS partners and advisors from the Wôpanâak (Wampanoag) Language Reclamation Project are featured in The Language of America: An Indian Story, next week at the Boston International Film Festival, Tuesday, April 20th, 5:30 PM, AMC/LOEWS Boston Common, 175 Tremont St., Boston, $10.00, (79 min).
Language advocates and leadership from the Passamaquoddy Tribe of Maine and the Narragansett Nation of Rhode Island also share their struggles for cultural survival in New England, and discuss their community-based work to maintain and revitalize their languages among younger generations. Produced by Cultural Survival’s new endangered languages partner, Watching Place Productions, the film follows three Native families into “a time when words had meanings so big they could not be translated into English. As the tribes unravel the secret of the survival of their 9,000- year-old culture, they confront the power of a lie that Americans have yet to question.”
View a one minute trailer at http://www.languageofamerica.com
UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues
The ninth session of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues will be held April 19-30 at the UN headquarters in New York. This year’s special theme is development with culture and identity. Cultural Survival is organizing two side events:
Thursday, April 22 1:15-2:45 PM
Persuading the US, New Zealand and Canada to adopt the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
1 UN Plaza
Conference Room DC2, 12th floor
New York, New York
Participants will consider how to persuade the US, New Zealand, and Canada to endorse the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples this year.
Friday, April 23 1:15-2:45 PM
Mapping Community-Based Protected Areas: a model for sustainable development and cultural and environmental protection
UNICEF Conference Room
1 UN Plaza
New York, New York
This event examines how taking a community-based approach to setting up protected areas can promote sustainable development. Such an approach integrates indigenous knowledge with solid science. By respecting traditional livelihoods, tenure, culture, and access to resources it also conserves ecosystems and biodiversity.
Cosponsors: CORALINA and the Heller School for Social Policy and Management, Brandeis University
Vanishing Words, Vanishing World is a feature on Lakota language (with a video dictionary).
but
I understand priorities but I love language. As children we were shocked to learn that our grandparents had never taught our parents the low German they had grown up speaking, because it allowed them to fit in better at school if they only spoke English at home. We asked our grandparents to teach us but they had lost too much by then. I think they were always mystified by our interest in their long-discarded language, but to us it was a kind of squandered inheritance.