Indigenous Food Sovereignty in the United States: Restoring Cultural Knowledge, Protecting Environments, and Regaining HealthDevon A. Mihesuah, Elizabeth Hoover “All those interested in Indigenous food systems, sovereignty issues, or environment, and their path toward recovery should read this powerful book.” —Kathie L. Beebe, American Indian Quarterly Centuries of colonization and other factors have disrupted indigenous communities’ ability to control their own food systems. This volume explores the meaning and importance of food sovereignty for Native peoples in the United States, and asks whether and how it might be achieved and sustained. Unprecedented in its focus and scope, this collection addresses nearly every aspect of indigenous food sovereignty, from revitalizing ancestral gardens and traditional ways of hunting, gathering, and seed saving to the difficult realities of racism, treaty abrogation, tribal sociopolitical factionalism, and the entrenched beliefs that processed foods are superior to traditional tribal fare. The contributors include scholar-activists in the fields of ethnobotany, history, anthropology, nutrition, insect ecology, biology, marine environmentalism, and federal Indian law, as well as indigenous seed savers and keepers, cooks, farmers, spearfishers, and community activists. After identifying the challenges involved in revitalizing and maintaining traditional food systems, these writers offer advice and encouragement to those concerned about tribal health, environmental destruction, loss of species habitat, and governmental food control. |
Contents
Challenges to Food | |
Grassroots Growing through Shared | |
K Ito Kawika B Winter and Wayne C Tanaka | |
Empowering Our Communities | |
Restoring Indigenous | |
What If the Seeds Do Not Sprout? The Cherokee Nation | |
Dennis Wall and Virgil Masayesva | |
Traditional Indigenous | |
Indigenous Agroecology | |
Life in Second Sight | |
Food | |
Food for Thought | |
List of Contributors | |
Teachings in Hopi Traditional Agriculture | |
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acorns agricultural Alaska Native Alu Pū ancestors animals Anishinaabe Apache beans biodynamic bison California ceremonial chefs Cherokee Nation Choctaw climate change colonial Comanches community members companion plants connections continue cooked corn create crops culinary cultivated cultural described developed diabetes diet Diné eating ecological economic elders Elizabeth Hoover environment environmental ethnobotany farmers farming fish food sovereignty food systems foodways garden gathering grow harvest Haudenosaunee Hawai‘i Hawaiʻi healthy food heirloom Hopi human hunting ʻōpelu Indigenous food sovereignty initiatives islands knowledge konohiki land lifestyles limu living loko iʻa medicine Mexico Mihesuah Mohawk momona Mountain Native American Native Hawaiian Navajo Nation Nephi nutritional O’odham obesity Oklahoma organizations participants percent permaculture political practices produce projects relationships restore seed sovereignty SeedBank share social soil spiritual squash stories subsistence sustainable traditional foods treaty tribal communities tribal members tribes University varieties White wild Winona LaDuke