Winona LaDuke, author and former Green Party vice presidential candidate, will be making two appearances on the UNM campus Tuesday to discuss indigenous people and environmental issues.
LaDuke is scheduled to appear at the "Indigenous Peoples and Sacred Sites" discussion at 9:30 a.m. at Anderson Schools of Management, Room 1016. She will also give a lecture titled, "All Our Relations" at 7 p.m. in Dane Smith Hall, Room 228.
Tuesday's morning panel includes LaDuke, members of the Sacred Alliances for Grassroots Equality, and Dan Simplicio, spokesperson for Zuni Tribal Council. The panel is scheduled to discuss the continuing fight to keep development from infringing on, and possibly destroying, the Petroglyphs National Monument as well as the Zuni Tribes' efforts to protect the Zuni Salt Lake, which they consider sacred. Both the panel discussion and the lecture are free.
Her book, "All Our Relations," gave UNM's Native American Studies program the theme for its 2001-2002 lecture series, said Glenaba Martinez, interim director of the University's Native American Studies program.
She said the inclusion of LaDuke in the lecture series was something of a no-brainer.
"What we wanted to focus on in this academic year was the notion of activism and how change takes place," Martinez said. "Like Ms. LaDuke, the people we've focused on have done environmental work but also made changes. Ms. LaDuke will be talking about activism and change in dealing with corporate America."
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LaDuke, 53, ran as the Green Party's vice-presidential candidate in 1996 and 2000 alongside presidential candidate Ralph Nader and is the program director of the Honor the Earth fund. A mother of two, she is also the founding director of the White Earth Land Recovery Project, which is active in the area around White Earth Reservation in Minnesota where LaDuke lives. She also teaches courses in Native Environmentalism at the University of Minnesota. In 1995, Time magazine named her as one of "50 Leaders of the Future."
Martinez said LaDuke's book, "All Our Relations," has tremendously influenced her program's students, as has LaDuke's novel "Last Standing Woman," which traces a family's matriarchal lineage as activists.
"Both books have been very inspirational," she said. "Many of our students really enjoy ('All Our Relations') because it's not just, 'Oh, look at the poor Indian.' It's about people making huge, tremendous changes in their communities. But you don't read about them in media because these people are working in their own community."
