The Wrap: Indigenous news from The Met to the Amazon
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The latest: The Metropolitan Museum of Art debuts its first exhibition by a Native curator, the Oscars get new Indigenous voters, giant Landback billboard art draws attention on Long Island, and a new film explores the history of injustice at Manzanar.
ART: What water means to Indigenous people
Water is life — a phrase that has taken on a more powerful meaning in the wake of pipeline protests, droughts and pollution. Artists bring the element to another level by drawing from past and present in a new exhibit at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. READ MORE – Sandra Hale Schulman, Special to ICT
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North Dakota has renewed its request to throw out a federal lawsuit brought by two Native American tribes that allege the state's new legislative map dilutes tribal members' voting strength.
The state said in court papers filed Thursday that it denies allegations by the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa and the Spirit Lake Tribe.
U.S. District Judge Peter Welte dismissed the state's argument earlier this month that the tribes lacked the standing to sue.
The Republican-controlled Legislature during its special session last fall approved a new map of legislative districts, based on updated census data. The map includes the new House subdistricts for the Fort Berthold and Turtle Mountain Indian reservations.
Turtle Mountain argues the split House district "packs" tribal members into a single subdistrict on its reservation, while diluting their vote in the non-reservation subdistrict. Spirit Lake alleges the new redistricting map dilutes American Indian voters on and near its reservation.
The case could go to trial next year if no resolution is reached, according to court filings. – Associated Press
Environmental criminals in the Brazilian Amazon destroyed public rainforests equal the size of El Salvador over the past six years, yet the Federal Police — the Brazilian version of the FBI — carried out only seven operations aimed at this massive loss, according to a new study.
The destruction took place in state and federal forests that are “unallocated,” meaning they do not have a designated use the way national parks and Indigenous territories do. According to official data, the Brazilian Amazon rainforest has about 580,000 square kilometers (224,000 square miles) of forests in this category, or an area almost the size of Ukraine. READ MORE – Associated Press
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Stephanie Plummer remembers her brother Kee Thompson as an exceedingly kind person, quiet at first but talkative and outgoing once he got to know people.
“If there was someone who was struggling and needed the shirt off his back, he would give it to them,” Plummer said during an interview with New Mexico In Depth.
Thompson and a friend, Allison Gorman, both citizens of the Navajo Nation, were murdered eight years ago by three Albuquerque teens who beat them with cinder blocks while they slept in a vacant lot on the city’s west side. Another man, Jerome Eskeets, barely managed to escape. READ MORE – New Mexico In Depth
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It took over a hundred years, and now Jim Thorpe is finally the official winner of gold medals in the 1912 Olympics. It took tenacity and lots of communication from different people over the years to make this happen.
Among those who led the way is Nedra Darling, who heads Bright Path Strong, and Billy Mills, who won Olympic gold in 1964.
Last month, the hallmark case Roe v. Wade was overturned by the Supreme Court. ICT’s Pauly Denetclaw caught up with Cecilia Fire Thunder in Washington, D.C. The Oglala Nation citizen is a nurse, community health planner and tribal leader.
Ballet Arizona is jumping through the hoops with Native children this summer. Hoop dance, that is. One of the organizers, Ginger Sykes Torres was the first female to win at the hoop dance world championships. READ MORE – ICT
ICT is set to expand by developing reporting partnerships in seven U.S. regions, using grant money from the American Journalism Project, according to an announcement Wednesday.
The American Journalism Project, a Washington, D.C.-based philanthropic organization dedicated to local news, announced a total investment of $3.15 million to three nonprofit news organizations, including ICT.
ICT will receive $1.3 million to fund a three-year project to establish reporting partnerships throughout the country. READ MORE – Kalle Benallie, ICT
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- Drought drives Las Vegas to cap size of home swimming pools: Citing worries about dwindling drinking water allocations from the drying-up Lake Mead reservoir on the depleted Colorado River, officials in Clark County voted this week to limit the size of new swimming pools.
- Hualapai leader urges Senate to OK water plan: Wells are failing under the stress of the continuing drought.
- Alaska homeless camp out in tent city: Alaska Natives make up nearly 16 percent of Anchorage’s population and almost half of people living in the state’s largest city without housing are Native.
- Australian environmental report finally recognizes Indigenous knowledge: The bleak, national assessment of the environment recommends an Indigenous rights-based approach.
- Blockchain technology could help Indigenous Americans gain control over their genomic data
- ‘Ghosts’: Oklahoma Short Film Tells The Story Of 3 Boy’s Attempted Boarding School Escape
- The truth about a massacre of Indigenous people in Argentina
- State takes another step to honor story of Ponca Chief Standing Bear
We want your tips, but we also want your feedback. What should we be covering that we’re not? What are we getting wrong? Please let us know. dalton@ictnews.org.
