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ECLC’s Indigenous Rights group invites you to join us for three educational experiences this summer and fall!
On Saturday, June 17, we’ll be hosting a trip to the Lower Sioux Agency in Morton, MN. The Lower Sioux Agency is where, in 1851, the Mdewakanton and Wapakute Dakota were relocated from their home territory, which included the SW Metro. Learn more about the U.S.-Dakota War, a conflict that was sparked there. This all-day trip will be best suited for teens and older.
On Saturday, August 19, we’ll be going to the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community’s annual Wacipi (pow wow). The dancing and drumming is matched by great eating and shopping! This partial-day trip is suited for all ages.
On Saturday, October 7, we have an opportunity to participate in a Sacred Sites Tour, led by a Native guide. The Tour will help you see familiar Twin Cities sites from a deeper, Indigenous lens. The tour takes a long morning and is best suited to those in high school and beyond.
If you are interested in learning more, please leave your name and email here.
Injustice legitimized by the Doctrine of Discovery spread across centuries and geographies. In the US, treaties almost always forced Indigenous people from their homelands.How might we, who now occupy these lands, acknowledge this history and act in ways that move us toward justice?
Indigenous peoples have a long history as storytellers. Take time this week to listen to some of these contemporary storytellers.
There are many opportunities to advocate for a better way. The insidiousness of the assumptions driven by the Doctrine of Discovery manifested in the late 19th Century and forward as Indian Boarding Schools. Indigenous children were taken from their families and sent to boarding schools which forbade their language and other cultural expressions. In our day, Indigenous people continue to disappear, too often murdered, proportinately far more often than other groups. These are just two justice issues that call for our attention.
Our county's history with its Indigenous peoples is a record too often unknown because it is too often unspoken.
Begin with the Doctrine of Discovery.
Let learning open your heart.
Our Indigenous neighbors are taking some fascinating approaches to their own health and wellbeing,
returning to the foods that sustained them for thousands of years before their economies were destroyed
when our government used treaties to take the land that had sustained them.