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Winona LaDuke, Native American activist and environmentalist promotes renewable energy on campus

by Juliana Spence
Exchange Staff
 

     Honored Native American activist, environmentalist, and writer Winona LaDuke shares her views on renewable energy plans, sustainable society goals, and democracy during a day long trip to Franklin Pierce College on Tuesday April 10. 

     Bill Beardslee, assistant director of interfaith campus ministries and club support, introduced LaDuke as on of the "spiritual giants of our time" Tuesday evening to the public audience that attended to hear her lecture in Pierce Hall.

     LaDuke is the Program Director of Honor the Earth, an organization dedicated to the awareness of Native environmental issues, and is the Founding Director of White Earth Land Recovery Project.  An Anishinaabekwe (Ojibwe) enrolled member of the Mississippi Band Anishinaabeg, she lives and works on the White Earth Reservation in Minnesota.  

     Kent Whitman, senior business lecturer at Franklin Pierce College and an Ojibwe, presented LaDuke with a certificate of honorary membership to the New England Aboriginal Council.  Abenacki Indian and French Canadian poet Cheryl Savageau read several poems before LaDuke's evening presentation, including "Poison in the Pond."  Savageau is a NH resident and has spent several terms at the MacDowell Artist Colony in Peterborough, NH.

     Introducing a Native American thought to the Tuesday Briefing audience LaDuke said, "What is the impact of the decisions we make today on the seventh generation from now?"  She insisted that this is we, American government included, should be asking when creating energy policies.  "What are the elements of a healthy society," she asked.

     America is the richest most powerful county in the world, LaDuke said during the Briefing, with "absence of the political will to do the right thing."  She insisted that Americans need to recognize the privilege of living in this country, with all its wealth, and question what can be done with that advantage.

     "The energy industry has heavily impacted the environment of indigenous people." LaDuke said.  She cited nuclear waste dumping on reservations and foresting among other things.  "The US needs to have an energy plan that is renewable and secure," she said.

     "The problem with being the largest energy market in the world," LaDuke said, "is that we're addicts.  We feel entitled.  We are addicted to energy and the problem with being an addict is relying on your dealer."

     LaDuke is working to use her White Earth Reservation as a model of a sustainable society with a renewable energy plan.  The energy plan consists of building wind turbines, cutting the level of consumption by a third, using biodiesel for fuel, and making their own based ethanol.

     "We're the poorest county in the state of Minnesota and if we can make a renewable energy plan, anyone can," LaDuke said.

     LaDuke also advocates for local farming to create a local food economy as well as a local energy economy rather than looking to outside sources. 

     In her evening lecture LaDuke shared with her audience stories that reflect the idea that are two paths that can be chosen from.  They were stories of resistance, of the preservation of sacred spaces. 

     While telling of the Native American relationship to the land and the resistance to the destruction of it LaDuke said, "Would we relate differently to land if we thought about it as sacred holy
land?"

     LaDuke left the evening audience with an invitation to work towards renewable energy.  "Change is made by individuals," LaDuke said.  "It is up to you.  Where are we going?  Who are we?  What is our relationship to land?"

     LaDuke also visited classes during her day on campus, including a woman's studies class.  She expressed her gratitude towards the community for having her.  "I had a really great day today," she said.  "It's very beautiful up here."

     LaDuke is the author of several books including All Our Relations and Recovering the Sacred.  She was also Ralph Nader's Green Party running mate in 1996 and 2000.  LaDuke was named Woman of the Year by Ms Magazine in 1997. 

     Currently LaDuke is working with the White Earth Land Recovery Project to farm fair trade organic wild rice, among other things.