Contextualizing Indigenous Peoples: A Global Perspective ((4 Credits))

Catalog description

This course addresses issues Indigenous peoples face and have faced as a result of changing power dynamics in the US and abroad. Students will learn to distinguish and theorize core differences between colonizer and Indigenous approaches to knowledge. We will engage in critical thinking about colonialism and its impacts on Indigenous peoples, the maintenance and dissemination of their knowledge, and the development of Indigenous academic knowledge by both insiders and outsiders. We will examine contentious questions between ways of knowing, such as those arising between origins stories and contemporary science, and oral traditions and written histories. We will look at how Indigenous people practice survivance on physical, cultural, and political fronts (epidemic diseases, health strategies; religious oppression, resilience and transformation; sovereignty and treaty violations, land reclamation; and who determines Native identity) in a variety of interactions, from armed to artistic resistance, in response to colonial empires and contemporary powers. We will outline today’s key legal issues and ecological concerns, including human rights and biopiracy.