Indigenous Studies Commons^™

The Economic, Mental Health, And Social Stressors During The Covid-19 Pandemic Among Native Americans In South Dakota, Savannah E. Lukkes

Honors Thesis

American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) communities test positive for COVID-19 and experience higher mortality than other racial and ethnic groups. These high rates of vulnerability could be connected to the systemic inequalities that have been experienced for centuries. This study aimed to compare socioeconomic stressors, concerns, and mental health experiences during the early COVID-19 pandemic between AI/AN and non-AIAN populations in South Dakota. The study sample (n=1,586) was grouped by AI/AN and non-AI/AN status based on self-identification of being AI/AN alone or in combination with another race/ethnicity. Participant responses to socioeconomic stressors and concerns (e.g., top concerns, level of concern, self-isolation, …

Wakara's Waterscapes: Storytelling, Cartography, And Rhetorical Sovereignty On The Shores Of The Green River, Abbey O'Brien

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

In the mid nineteenth-century, Wakara, a prominent Ute leader, witnessed the invasion of his homeland by Mormon settlers and mountain-men. He met the scouts and explorers who were sent out to examine the land and waterscapes, and who drew maps along their way. It was those same maps which were eventually used as tools to justify colonial expansion all across the Utah territories, Wakara’s home. But Wakara resisted. Employing his understandings of the roles that cartography and the written word played in Mormon and settler discourse, Wakara created his own maps in order to assert his Indigenous authority over the …

Consumo Verde ¿Para Quién?: Las Tierras, Cosmovisiones, Y Personas Escondidas Detrás De La Fiebre Del Oro Blanco / Green Consumption, For Who?: The Lands, World Views, And People Hidden Behind The White Gold Rush., Gabriel Gómez

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

La “Transición energética” a consumo verde ha sido reconocida globalmente como el camino necesario para evitar lo peor de la crisis climática, pero es una solución que depende en un aumento del litio. La manera más usada para extraer el litio genera impactos destructivos en los ambientes que contienen el recurso, y en Sudamérica, donde los habitantes son mayormente indígena. Usando las comunidades de Salinas Grandes y Laguna de Guayatayoc en Jujuy, Argentina como un caso práctico, este proyecto propone analizar cómo el discurso hegemónico del consumo verde invisibiliza a gente indígena, y cómo estas comunidades resisten entendimientos occidentales y …

Observaciones De La Medicina Mapuche Y El Mito De La Medicina Interculturalidad En Chile Con La Machi Rosita Barboza, Anat Gilligan-Steinberg

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Chile cuenta con un sistema de salud intercultural, que promueve el acceso a servicios de salud culturalmente competentes para la población indígena. A través de mi pasantía con la machi Rosita Barboza, acompañándola a centros de salud, en ceremonias de sanación mapuche y ayudando en la preparación y distribución de remedios; he llegado a la conclusión de que no es más que un mito de la interculturalidad. Existe un conflicto constante entre las definiciones de salud occidental e indígena, que impiden la disponibilidad de salud complementaria. La salud occidental se basa en una definición biomédica de la salud, la cosmovisión …

El Empoderamiento De Personas Embarazadas Y Posparto En Arica, Chile: Perspectivas Indígenas Y Biomédicas, Abby Perce

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

El parto, sin importar las tradiciones o los procedimientos utilizados, es un proceso transformador tanto para quien da a luz como para el bebé. Si bien los procesos de embarazo, parto y posparto son experiencias individualizadas, el apoyo de la comunidad y la atención médica cuidadosa pueden marcar una gran diferencia en los sentimientos de empoderamiento y satisfacción en la vida de los pacientes. Este estudio exploratorio cualitativo tiene como objetivo comprender los contextos culturales que influyen en el apoyo disponible para las personas embarazadas y puérperas en Arica, Chile, así como investigar las formas en que este apoyo conduce …

Inclusión Cultural En Fonasa: Parto Aymara Como Un Estudio De Caso, Madison Singleton

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Los primeros años de la década de 2000s sirven como un período legal transformador en Chile, debido al auge de los grupos de representación indígena y la introducción de la ley 20.584 que asegura un modelo de interculturalidad en los servicios de salud. El objetivo de esta investigación es comprender los factores que impactaron en la priorización de la inclusión cultural en el sistema público de salud (FONASA), utilizando el parto aymara en Arica como un estudio de caso. Esta investigación toma forma en un diseño de investigación cualitativa y exploratoria utilizando 5 entrevistas y 5 observaciones, así como las …

Costumbre Y Carnavales; El Rol De Alcohol En La Comunidad Aymara De Putre, Billy White

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Esta investigación tuvo como objetivo evaluar el impacto del alcohol en la comunidad aymara de Putre, localidad rural del norte de Chile. Se realizaron 17 entrevistas semiformales en Putre y sus alrededores con profesionales de la salud de la comunidad, pacientes adultos del CESFAM local, curanderos tradicionales aymaras y líderes comunitarios. El estudio encontró que el consumo de alcohol en Putre está intrínsecamente relacionado con las costumbres y la cultura aymara, ya que su perspectiva sobre el alcohol informa su consumo. El alcohol tiene un papel importante en la religión aymara, la medicina y las fiestas locales. Los hábitos de …

Medicina Tradicional En La Urbe: El Funcionamiento Del Sistema De Salud Mapuche En Santiago, Mariko Yatsuhashi

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

En Santiago, Chile, una ciudad con más de 5 millones de personas, el pueblo originario Mapuche ha logrado la reconstrucción de su sistema tradicional de salud para servir la comunidad urbana de la comunidad mapuche. Hoy en día, la mayoría de gente mapuche viven en ambientes urbanos debido a una migración masiva desde su territorio ancestral en el sur, que creó una población distinta de gente mapuche llamada warriache, o gente de la ciudad. Después de una expansión nacional de los derechos básicos de pueblos originarios en los años ‘90, el pueblo originario Mapuche, junto con otros pueblos originarios, podía …

Dual Taxation - Unbalanced And Arbitrary, Benjamin M. Simon

American Indian Law Journal

"Dual Taxation" in Indian Country happens when a state assesses taxes on private, non-tribal activities or transactions on tribal land in addition to taxes assessed by a tribe. Some analysts suggest that dual (or double) taxation puts tribal governments and citizens at a disadvantage, but the situation may be more nuanced. While dual taxation has been analyzed in depth from a legal perspective, this paper analyzes its economic consequences. With taxation, the stakes can be high. State tax revenues generated on tribal lands are revenues that tribes forgo collecting, limiting the tribal resources available for economic development and social programs. …

Native American Intellectual Property Protection: Altering Federal Ip Law And The Indian Arts And Crafts Act To Aid Tribal Economic Development, Trey V. Perez

American Indian Law Journal

Native Americans tribes remain subject to an epidemic of poverty. Although tribal gaming has provided relief and a method of economic development for some groups, other tribes are unable to employ gaming to bring in revenue and grow out of poverty. One method to assist tribes that cannot use tribal gaming could be amending federal intellectual property law to better suit tribes needs and allowing them to better exploit the billion-dollar Native American arts and crafts industry.

Moreover, tribes are able to determine which artists qualify as “Indian” under the Indian Arts and Crafts Act, which leaves individual artists subject …

A Comparative Plague Study Of Cacao Fungal Disease In Cacao Pods Within Monocultures And Indigenous Agroforests In Ecuador’S Napo Province, Seamus Mccarthy

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This study analyzes the composition of three major fungal diseases in Theobroma cacao fruits compared between monocultures and chakra agroforests in the Napo province of Ecuador with the goal of noting similarities and differences in the disease composition between the two systems, as well as investigate possible variation within this poorly understood category of agroforest to better structure future studies. Cacao pods on sampled trees were counted and fungal infections identified visually and by touch. Chakra systems were selected in the communities of Cinco de Enero and Seis de Marzo to the Southwest of Tena, Ecuador. Monoculture data was collected …

Toward A Tribal Role In Groundwater Management, Alexandra Fay

American Indian Law Journal

This Article considers the Agua Caliente groundwater litigation a decade since its inception. It recounts the most recent developments in the case, notably the move to mediation and the strategic work that brought the water districts to the table. The Article places this monumental case in context: in the history of colonization and tribal-state relations, the present climate crisis, and the State of California’s groundwater management regime. The Article ultimately outlines the present opportunity to reimagine the role of tribes in groundwater management.

Change By Drips And Drabs Or No Change At All: The Coming Undrip Battles In Canadian Courts, Kevin Gray

American Indian Law Journal

The enactment of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Persons (“UNDRIP”) into Canadian law has long been a goal for Indigenous groups in Canada. Its enactment has been entailed as potentially game changing. Commentators have argued that the incorporation of UNDRIP into Canadian law will produce a wholesale transformation of Canadian law, including providing a veto to Indigenous groups to development on their traditional lands and eliminating the doctrine of discovery. In this paper, I consider various arguments that have been advanced as to how UNDRIP may require changes to Canadian law. I argue, conversely, …

Case Law On American Indians, Thomas P. Schlosser

American Indian Law Journal

An update on American Indian case law from September 2021-October 2022.

Oil, Indifference, And Displacement: An Indigenous Community Submerged And Tribal Relocation In The 21st Century, Jared Munster

American Indian Law Journal

Coastal land loss driven by erosion and subsidence, and amplified by climate change, has forced the abandonment and resettlement of the remote Louisiana Indigenous community of Isle de Jean Charles. This relocation, to a relatively ‘safer’ site inland has led to division among the residents and will inevitably cause irreparable damage to the culture and traditions of the Houma and Biloxi Chitimacha Confederation of Muskogees peoples who called this small, isolated island home. Driven to the water’s edge by European colonization of south Louisiana, this community developed a dynamic subsistence lifestyle based on agriculture, hunting, and fishing which survived undisturbed …

The Effects Of Climate Change In Guam, Olga M. Zyzanska, Brooke R. Ashfield, Kate E. Eulberg

Student Publications

The purpose of this project is to dive into the harm that climate change has on Guam and its population. The objectives of our project are centered on highlighting the creative resistance of the CHamoru Indigenous community on Guam to established structures of colonialism and militarization during increasing climate crises. This project explores questions such as: How is Guam being impacted by climate change? Is the impact severe and/or immediate? How is the Indigenous community in Guam affected? How does US policy help or harm the island and its Indigenous population? What is being done to protect the island and …

Brain Volume, Energy Balance, And Cardiovascular Health In Two Nonindustrial South American Populations, Hillard Kaplan, Paul L. Hooper, Margaret Gatz, Wendy J. Mack, E. Meng Law, Helena C. Chui, M. Linda Sutherland, James D. Sutherland, Christopher J. Rowan, L. Samuel Wann, Adel H. Allam, Randall C. Thompson, David E. Michalik, Guido Lombardi, Michael I. Miyamoto, Daniel Eid Rodriguez, Juan Copajira Adrian, Raul Quispe Gutierrez, Bret A. Beheim, Daniel K. Cummings, Edmond Seabright, Sarah Alami, Angela R. Garcia, Kenneth Buetow, Gregory S. Thomas, Caleb E. Finch, Jonathan Stieglitz, Benjamin C. Trumble, Michael D. Gurven, Andrei Irimia

ESI Publications

Little is known about brain aging or dementia in nonindustrialized environments that are similar to how humans lived throughout evolutionary history. This paper examines brain volume (BV) in middle and old age among two indigenous South American populations, the Tsimane and Moseten, whose lifestyles and environments diverge from those in high-income nations. With a sample of 1,165 individuals aged 40 to 94, we analyze population differences in cross-sectional rates of decline in BV with age. We also assess the relationships of BV with energy biomarkers and arterial disease and compare them against findings in industrialized contexts. The analyses test three …

Fighting The Illicit Antiquities "Artworld": A Critical Approach To The Heritage Laws Of Guatemala, Irene Marti Gil

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation examines the suitability of the legal framework for the protection of cultural heritage in Guatemala, which is the country of origin for over thirty percent of the Maya objects traded in the antiquities market, and proposes strategies that improve the effectiveness of the law. To examine the heritage laws enforced by the Republic of Guatemala, I implement linguistic anthropological methods of qualitative research.

Discourse Analysis, Critical Discourse Analysis, and Conceptual Analysis on the national heritage policies of Guatemala reveal the existence of ontological problems regarding the conceptualization of heritage as a monolithic entity reflecting a State-led narrative with …

Culturally Responsive Persuasion In Alexander Posey’S Fus Fixico Letters, Tereza M. Szeghi

English Faculty Publications

Alexander Posey (1873–1908) was a Creek humorist, journalist, editor, and poet who crafted his Fus Fixico letters to help fellow Creeks negotiate upheavals wrought by allotment, dissolution of their tribal government, and Oklahoma’s impending statehood (which ultimately incorporated Indian Territory). While validating his people’s varied perspectives with a culturally responsive approach to literary persuasion, Posey nudged readers toward positions he thought best for Creek cultural continuance and economic survival. The letters’ dialogic structure—inclusive of diverse political perspectives—validated his people’s community-oriented values and was more persuasive than prescriptive. Posey utilized four overlapping rhetorical strategies in his literary approach to political activism: …

Oo-Mah-Ha Ta-Wa-Tha (Omaha City), Fannie Reed Giffen, Susette La Flesche Tibbles, Judi M. Gaiashkibos

Zea E-Books Collection

“This little book tells many important tribal stories for today and for future generations. These historic vignettes of the Omaha Nation and its leaders are shared so personally by author Fannie Reed Giffen and her col­laborators, Susette and Susan La Flesche. It has been a treasure of mine for 25 years and I hope it becomes one of yours.

The re-publication of the original comes on the 125-year anniversary of the 1898 Omaha Trans-Mississippi Expo­sition and Indian Congress. Its arrival is timely as many of its stories and people are vital to our nation’s history. A sculpture of Omaha Chief …