Geographies of hope in cultural resources protection

Abstract

This work to articulate a geography of hope in the face of institutionalized epistemic injustice extends the emerging Indigenous political ecology approach through engagement with cultural resources law and policy. While Indigenous political ecology offers a framework to understand the context in which geographies of hope are created, geographies of hope are specific spatial processes that exemplify resilience, vision, and ingenuity in adverse circumstances. This paper focuses on such hopeful, place-based work to bring US and, specifically, California, cultural resources and repatriation law and policy into alignment with contemporary international Indigenous human rights standards. The Native and non-Native allies advocating for legal and political change are both focused on protecting particular places and their entwined epistemologies, and on altering processes of decision-making that privilege non-Indigenous epistemologies. Hope is specifically fostered in efforts to educate non-Native citizens on the continuities between past and present, in highlighting the efforts of Indigenous people working to care for and protect their heritage on/in/with the land, and in fostering legal frameworks that center justice.