Environmental justice has been up and coming recently. Typically affecting minorities, environmental justice has been an active movement not just for a more clean land and air, but also for the right to be represented at the decision-making table. Native Americans’ culture and way of life is centralized on the ecosystem. Nature and the surrounding land is their main provider of food, water, and sources used in living and everyday life. Besides pollution and bad placement of waste facilities, the main problem is there is not a complete understanding of what is important to the community.
In Environmental Justice in Indian Country by Stuart Harris and Barbara Harper, they discuss how Native Americans’ lifestyle and religious life relies heavily on natural resources. Environmental justice is important to such natives because these resources are key to their survival. Substantial changes are needed to improve living conditions, however the people responsible are not accustomed to creating a healthy lifestyle in a low class area. The EPA is much stronger than before, and wants to get involved because the Native Americans’ environment goes hand in hand with their economy. When cultural use, exposure, environmental goods, functions, and services are contaminated, a problem arises. The problem must be addressed as a direct effect on a combination of the environment and the Native Americans. Rather than taking into account how many Indians live in area, they should focus on the traditional and trust resources of each tribe. A plan must be created to teach the idea of risk ethics, sustainability, and human rights.
Stuart Harris and Barbara Harper, both authors of this article, used research and other references throughout ...
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...ch supplies. In the article Environmental Racism, Tribal Sovereignty and Nuclear Waste, Bullcreek, one of the Indians who lives on Utah reservation said, "The real issue is not the money. The real issue is who we are as Native Americans and what we believe in. If we accept these wastes, we're going to lose our tradition." The government should not intrude on the Native Americans’ traditions and culture by placing waste or hazardous facilities on or near their reservations. These government agencies and organizations do not know what their traditions are; however, in Environmental Justice in Indian Country, it is acknowledged that the first step to creating healthier living conditions is knowing what is relevant to the community. Assessments are regularly done without consulting the community about what is important and what risks or impacts need to be assessed.
Modern day Native American are widely known as stewards of the environment who fight for conservation and environmental issues. The position of the many Native American as environmentalists and conservationists is justified based on the perception that before European colonists arrived in the Americas, Native Americans had little to no effect on their environment as they lived in harmony with nature. This idea is challenged by Shepard Krech III in his work, The Ecological Indian. In The Ecological Indian, Krech argues that this image of the noble savage was an invented tradition that began in the early 1970’s, and that attempts to humanize Native Americans by attempting to portray them as they really were. Krech’s arguments are criticized by Darren J Ranco who in his response, claims that Krech fails to analyze the current state of Native American affairs, falls into the ‘trap’ of invented tradition, and accuses Krech of diminishing the power and influence of Native Americans in politics. This essay examines both arguments, but ultimately finds Krech to be more convincing as Krech’s
Talking Back to Civilization: Indian Voices from the Progressive Era edited by Frederick E. Hoxie is a book which begins with an introduction into the life of Charles Eastman and a brief overview of the history of Native Americans and their fight for justice and equal rights, it then continues by describing the different ways and avenues of speaking for Indian rights and what the activists did. This leads logically into the primary sources which “talk back” to the society which had overrun their own. The primary sources immerse the reader into another way of thinking and cause them to realize what our societal growth and even foundation has caused to those who were the true natives. The primary sources also expand on the main themes of the book which are outlines in the introduction. They are first and most importantly talking back to the “pale faces”, Indian education, religion, American Indian policy, the image of the Indians presented in America. The other chapters in the book further expanded on these ideas. These themes will be further discussed in the following chapters along with a review of this
The Native American’s way of living was different from the Europeans. They believed that man is ruled by respect and reverence for nature and that nature is an ancestor or relative. The Native American’s strongly belie...
Throughout the 1925-1975 period, the Native American population of the United States has faced many obstacles. Just a few years before, they had been suppressed by the federal government’s “Anti-Long Hair” policy for all Native American males. This would set the stage for future cultural restraint on the Indians. However, they continued to fight for equality. All through this time period, the experience of the Native American culture has been a struggle for equality in their homeland.
In the article The Clash of Cultures, William Cronon and Richard White delve into “the interrelations between people and their environment,” (11) specifically, between the American Indians and the Europeans and the Americas. The reason Cronon and White wrote this article was, “In part, a result of our current concern with pollution and the exhaustion of valuable natural resources, but it has also proved to be a valuable way of learning more about how people of past generations and different cultures dealt with nature and with one another.” (11)
Hooker dismissed various scholars’ theories as to why indigenous conclusion as to why Afro-Latinos experience less m... ... middle of paper ... ... eas about the other to discredit claims to the land and present themselves as better caretakers before potential decision-makers. Mollet’s qualitative methods are similar to those I would like to employ, but I would be working in a different nation. I will conduct interviews to gather the opinions of both Afro-descendent groups and indigenous groups on how they view environmental management and decision-making.
As a tribal member it is very important to care for nature and respect the land. With the recent problems Michigan has faced, including but not limited to, the Enbridge 5 pipeline that runs under the straights of mackinaw and the Flint water contamination, it is important to me that we do what we can to be a part of the solution verses the problem. No matter what the amount of recycling Bay Mills Community College accumulates, with no recycling plan set in place the tribal college of Bay Mills will remain a part of the problem.
Native Americans have suffered from one of America’s most profound ironies. The American Indians that held the lands of the Western Hemisphere for thousands of years have fallen victim to some of the worst environmental pollution. The degradation of their surrounding lands has either pushed them out of their homes, made their people sick, or more susceptible to disease. If toxic waste is being strategically placed near homes of Native Americans and other minority groups, then the government industry and military are committing a direct offense against environmental justice. Productions of capitalism and militarism are deteriorating the lands of American Indians and this ultimately is environmental racism.
The political climate of environmental injustice movement does not seem promising. With a very polarized, divided Congress, and powerful monopoly run corporations, advocates have to battle—harder than ever to better their communities. Vig and Kraft point out the difficulties of getting environmental legislation passed through Congress when gridlock is occurring. They dissected the issue of policy gridlock into these main indicators: the diverging policy views due to partisan differences, separated powers and bicameralism which occurs when there are major disagreements between the House, Congress, and the President, the complexity of environmental problems where the injustice is so complex that
A primary theme in Native American storytelling is a deep respect for the environment. In a society that is based upon sharing, each individual is keenly aware of his or her own responsibility, giving in equal value to what is received. Native Americans use storytelling to illustrate the mutual interdependence between tribal members and the natural resources that provide them
Sandefur, G. (n.d.). American Indian reservations: The first underclass areas? Retrieved April 28, 2014, from http://www.irp.wisc.edu/publications/focus/pdfs/foc121f.pdf
The information collated in this report was collected from a variety of secondary sources including websites, books, documentaries, statistics and academic journals. A report format was selected to ensure that information concerning the guiding questions were successfully answered. While surveys were conducted information collected was discredited due to the reliability of the information collected.
If a complete transformation was made throughout North America to implement native culture, we would view nature differently. Native Americans believe that Mother Earth is sacred and that it is the ultimate sin to
When we think of environmental justice, we often focus on the ecosystem in which we as humans live, and the natural resources and non-human animals that live there. We tend to think about ethical uses of natural resources, and the effects it has on the non-human animals, such as animal rights, endangerment and extinction, loss of habitat, deforestation, erosion, and pollution. Environmental justice is another factor that is concerned with environmental protection and social justice, including humans into the mix of the complex ecosystem. Environmental justice considers the fair and equal distribution of cost and benefits between humans and the natural world. (1) Environmental justice is also defined as the fair treatment of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income and no particular group should have to bear more than their fair share of the burden of negative environmental consequences from industrial pollution or
“Unless humanity is suicidal, it should want to preserve, at the minimum, the natural life-support systems and processes required to sustain its own existence” (Daily p.365). I agree with scientist Gretchen Daily that drastic action is needed now to prevent environmental disaster. Immediate action and changes in attitude are not only necessary for survival but are also morally required. In this paper, I will approach the topic of environmental ethics from several related sides. I will discuss why the environment is a morally significant concern, how an environmental ethic can be developed, and what actions such an ethic would require to maintain and protect the environment.