Land Back

Indigenous lands back into Indigenous hands: that is the aim of the Landback movement.

In Gillam, Manitoba, treaty promises clash with hydro development. As the people of Fox Lake Cree Nation continue to push for land from the government, leaders like Conway Arthurson try to find middle ground with an industry that has historically tried to push them out. In the 1960s, Manitoba Hydro moved into this area - building dams and flooding the land that once held the people of Fox Lake. Arthurson has acted as a negotiator in the community’s decades-long fight for a place to call home - a fight that gets more complicated with every dam Manitoba Hydro builds. And right now they’re building the biggest one of all.

In South Dakota, there is no place more sacred than He Sapa, or the Black Hills, to the Lakota. Also known as Mount Rushmore, the site is famous for its massive carvings of U.S. presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln. On July 3, 2020, Nick Tilsen was arrested there as part of a protest against former President Trump's fireworks rally on what is traditionally and legally Lakota land. Tilsen is a citizen of the Oglala Lakota Nation and the founder of NDN Collective. The group recently created Landback Magazine, as a means to connect and exchange knowledge with other Indigenous nations.

In the Kingdom of Hawaii, Mauna Kea is revered by the people. So much so that their Kapuna - or elders - put their bodies on the line to protect this sacred mountain from a thirty meter telescope or TMT. Since the 1960s, the University of Hawaii has built 13 giant telescopes on the summit, each time promising it would be the last. For decades, Hawaiians have pushed back to protect Mauna Kea from any future developments. Noe Noe Wong-Wilson was born and raised on the island of Oʻahu. She is one of the first board members of the newly established Mauna Kea Stewardship and Oversight Authority. Pua Case was born and raised on the Island of Hawai’i. She’s the program director of Mauna Kea Education and Awareness.