Sacred Sites Protection and Indigenous Women’s Activism: Empowering Grassroots Social Movements to Influence Public Policy. A Look into the “Women of Standing Rock” and “Idle No More” Indigenous Movements

Abstract

Religion and public policy are interconnected across a variety of issues. One aspect where this linkage has been understudied is religion and Indigenous sacred sites protection. This article aims to address this gap by analyzing how Indigenous women’s activism advances this cause. The focus is on how Indigenous Peoples, specifically women, use grassroots activism to provoke change on public policy in the context of the protection of Indigenous sacred sites. Two case studies are used to illustrate this concept: the American “Women of Standing Rock” and the Canadian “Idle No More” grassroots social movements. My analysis draws from interpretative methods. Interpretative research revolves around the concept of individuals as active producers of meaning. The women-led grassroots social movements at issue highlight a fundamental lack of awareness of the historical and current struggles of Indigenous Peoples, both in the US and Canada. Modern technologies and social media provide democratic means for grassroots social movements to be heard and empowered. The growing movement by Indigenous women to assert their rights, and their quest for self-determination in land use and sacred sites protection create a positive discourse that advances Indigenous women’s position in crossing the obstacles onto “institutional places of privilege,” hence influencing public policy.

“Conflicts of interests” within and between elite assemblages in the legal production of space: Indigenous cultural heritage preservation and the Dakota Access Pipeline

“…While SRST members generously participated in many interviews, providing important perspectives on regulatory processes, I direct primary analytical attention here to US government elites in an effort to achieve what Laura Nader calls “studying up:” “to study the colonizers rather than the colonized, the culture of power rather than the culture of powerlessness, the culture of affluence rather than the culture of poverty” (1972, p. 289). Important critical scholarship has examined resistance to resource extraction and transportation in settler‐colonial societies (e.g., Bosworth, 2021; Curley, 2019; Gedicks, 2001; Gottardi, 2020; LaDuke, 1999; LeQuesne, 2019; Simpson & Le Billon, 2021; Van Sant et al, 2021); here, instead, I investigate settler‐colonial government elites to better understand how they do not currently, but potentially could, serve citizens rather than simply enabling industry. Conducting in‐depth interviews, and reviewing colorful internal email exchanges, allowed me insight into Corps culture, and employees’ particular interests and emotions.…”

Protecting Nature: Religious Ecofeminism in Indigenous Women’s Movements

“…Secondly, studies that explore indigenous women's spiritual and territory advocacy in defense of land and collective rights. In this case, the practice of spiritual advocacy is a form of expression of the law of origin, customary law, and truthtelling (Pastor & Santamaria, 2021;Gottardi, 2020;Nandi & Garg, 2017). Third, it examines the practice of rejection of thought and body, land and body, and the separation of life and non-life by indigenous women (Altamirano-Jiménez, 2021;Rius et al, 2011;O'Faircheallaigh, 2013).…”