This article critically engages with the intersections of Indigeneity, decoloniality, and environmental disruption through a critique of the imposition of Bilagáanaa (Western) planning paradigms on the Navajo Nation governmental structures. We examine the Navajo Nation Chapter House Community Land Use Plan and emphasize how community-based processes of knowledge production, like mind maps, challenge and reframe the Navajo Nation Land policies. Historically, architectural and planning consultants produced comprehensive plans that are neither culturally suited to the desires of Diné (Navajo Nation citizens). These externally imposed processes often disregard the distinctive social dynamics, built environments, and community-based economies of Diné life, while simultaneously failing to articulate a sustainable, long-term vision for environmental and economic resilience. In response, we highlight how Diné apply the principles of Sa’ah Naagháí Bik’eh Hózhóón’ (critical Diné Land-based planning praxis).
AronilthW.Jr. (1992). Foundation of Navajo culture (2nd ed.). Self-published.
2.
AtencioM. (2023). Dinétahdi Kéédahwiit’ínígíí Ayóo Dahnihidziil. In LeeL. L. (Ed.), Níhi kéyah: Navajo homeland (pp. 35–44). University of Arizona Press.
3.
AttakaiS. (2023). Challenges to Diné Binkéyah in 2023: Nihikéyah Bich’ááh Yéiilti’Doo. In LeeL. L. (Ed.), Níhi kéyah: Navajo homeland (pp. 81–108). University of Arizona Press.
4.
AustinJ. R. D. (2017). Diné sovereignty, a legal and traditional analysis. In DenetdaleJ.NezJ.LeeL. L. (Eds.), Navajo sovereignty. Understandings and visions of the Diné communities (pp. 19–42). University of Arizona Press.
5.
BenallyH.BenallyM. (2017). A cultural, spiritual, and health impact assessment of oil drilling operations in the Navajo Nation areas of Counselor, Torreon, and Ojo Encino chapters. Counselor Health Impact Assessment (HIA)—K’é Bee Hózhǫǫgo Iiná Silá (KBHIS) Committee.
6.
CredoJ.TorkelsonJ.RockT.IngramJ. C. (2019). Quantification of elemental contaminants in unregulated water across Western Navajo Nation. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 16(15), Article 2727. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16152727
7.
CurleyA. (2019). T’áá hwó ají t’éego and the moral economy of Navajo coal workers. Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 109(1), 71–86. https://doi.org/10.1080/24694452.2018.1488576
8.
CurleyA. (2022). Resources is just another word for colonialism. In HimleyM.HaviceE.ValdiviaG. (Eds.), The Routledge handbook of critical resource geography (pp. 79–89). Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.
9.
CurleyA.ListerM. (2020). Already existing dystopias: Tribal sovereignty, extraction, and decolonizing the anthropocene. In MoisioS.KochN.JonasA. E. G.LizotteC.LuukkonenJ. (Eds.), Handbook on the changing geographies of the state (pp. 251–262). Elgaronline.
10.
CurleyA.SmithS. (2020). Against colonial grounds: Geography on Indigenous lands. Dialogues in Human Geography, 10(1), 37–40. https://doi.org/10.1177/2043820619898900
11.
DorriesH.HenryR.HugillD.McCrearyT.TomiakJ. (Eds.). (2019). Settler city limits: Indigenous resurgence and colonial violence in the urban prairie West. Michigan State University Press.
12.
EstesN.YazzieM. K.DenetdaleJ.CorreiaD. (2021). Red Nation rising: From bordertown violence to Native liberation. PM.
13.
FoxworthR.BenallyM. (2024). Nation building and Indigenous institutions. In LightfootS.MaddisonS. (Eds.), Handbook of Indigenous public policy (pp. 98–119). Edward Elgar Publishing. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781800377011.00011
14.
GreyeyesW. (2023). Rethinking Nihikéyah in 2023: Defying lateral animosities and bureaucratic maizes of homesite lease living. In LeeL. L. (Ed.), Níhi kéyah: Navajo homeland (pp. 109–135). University of Arizona Press.
15.
HaleM. L. (2018). The Navajo Local Governance Act (LGA): A help or hindrance to grassroots self-government?American Indian Culture and Research Journal, 42(1), 91–114. https://doi.org/10.17953/AICRJ.42.1.HALE
16.
HarjoL. (2019). Spiral to the stars: Mvskoke tools of futurity. University of Arizona Press.
17.
HibbardM. (2021). Indigenous planning: From forced assimilation to self-determination. Journal of Planning Literature, 37(1), 17–27. https://doi.org/10.1177/08854122211026641
JojolaT. (2008). Indigenous planning—An emerging context. Institute of Urban Studies, University of Winnipeg, 17(Suppl. 1), S37–S47.
20.
JojolaT. (2013). Ch. 20 Indigenous planning: Towards a seven generations model. In WalkerR.JojolaT.NatcherD. (Eds.), Reclaiming Indigenous planning (pp. 457–472). McGill-Queen’s University Press.
21.
JojolaT. (2017). The people are beautiful already: Indigenous design and planning. Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum.
22.
JojolaT. (2024, November7–9). Honoring Ted Jojola: Holding space for the future of Indigenous planning [Conference presentation]. ACSP 2024 Annual Conference, Seattle, WA, United States.
23.
KovachM. (2021). Indigenous methodologies: Characteristics, conversations, and contexts (2nd ed.). University of Toronto Press.
24.
LeeL. L. (Ed.). (2023). Níhi kéyah: Navajo homeland. University of Arizona Press.
25.
LevyJ. E.HendersonE. B.AndrewsT. J. (1989). The effects of regional variation and temporal change on matrilineal elements of Navajo social organization. Journal of Anthropological Research, 45(4), 351–377. https://doi.org/10.1086/jar.45.4.3630515
26.
Lopez-HuertasM. J. (2025a). Planning in re-existence: Decolonial cracks and Indigenous futurities.Journal of Planning Education and Research, 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1177/0739456X251321749
27.
Lopez-HuertasM. J. (2025b). ‘We don’t believe they are dead, they are just resting’: Indigenous Knowledges as epistemological reclamation in planning. Landscape Research, 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1080/01426397.2024.2369686
ParrishM. (2018). Local governance and reform: Local empowerment. Dine Policy Institute.
35.
PerryJ. (2023). Ha’a’aahdéé’ Ntsékees: Concepts of land from an Eastern Navajo Leader. In LeeL. L. (Ed.), Nihikéyah: Navajo homeland (pp. 23–34). University of Arizona Press.
36.
PowellD. E. (2017). Toward transition? Challenging extractivism and the politics of the inevitable on the Navajo Nation. In JalbertK.WillowA.CasagrandeD.PaladinoS. (Eds.), ExtrACTION: Impacts, engagements, and alternative futures (pp. 211–226). Routledge.
37.
PowellD. E.CurleyA. (2008). K’e, Hozhó, and non-governmental politics on the Navajo Nation: Ontologies of difference manifest in environmental activism. Anthropological Quarterly, 81(1), 17–58.
38.
RoanJ. (2024). We belong to nature. We’re part of nature. Leading the Way. The Wisdom of the Navajo People, 22(6), 4–8.
39.
RoysterJ. V.BlummM. C.Kronk WarnerE. A. (2023). Native American natural resources law: Cases and materials (5th ed.). Carolina Academic Press.
40.
ShirleyM. P. (2015). Role of schools in the community development of Kin Dah Lichii, Arizona [Master’s thesis, University of New Mexico]. UNM Digital Repository. https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/arch_etds/22
41.
SimpsonL. B. (2015). The place where we all live and work together. In TevesS. N.SmithA.RahejaM. H. (Eds.), Native studies keywords (pp. 18–24).
42.
TuckE.McKenzieM. (2015). Place in research: Theory, methodology, and methods. Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.
43.
WebsterR. M. (2016). This land can sustain us: Cooperative land use planning on the Oneida Reservation. Planning Theory & Practice, 17(1), 9–34. https://doi.org/10.1080/14649357.2015.1135250
44.
WheelerJ. J.LeeL. L. (2023). On the land that holds my birth cord. In LeeL. L. (Ed.), Níhi kéyah: Navajo homeland (pp. 163–177). University of Arizona Press.
