Carter Brown – News Editor
On March 1, 2022, the first forum-style open participation meeting hosted by the President’s Council on Indigenous Relations (PCIR) occurred. At 2 P.M., the meeting began with a brief land acknowledgement given by president Rebecca Bergman. “I want to pause to acknowledge that we are gathered here today on the homeland of the Dakota people, who have endured hardships and broken promises, that have experienced genocide and were driven out of their home…We [are here to] honor their history and their talents, gifts and contributions to the St. Peter-Greater Mankato area and Minnesota,” Bergman said.
After the land acknowledgement, a brief update was given by PCIR co-chair Professor Ursula Lindqvist on some goals that had been narrowed down by the newly-formed council on what their first step should be. The list was extensive, with multiple categories of work that the council had these additional goals under, some of these being academic work, accountability and communication, external relationship building, and more.
Amidst the long list of plans, some goals that were addressed in the ongoing conversation between the council and the attendees. Most of them revolved around forming relationships with Indigenous peoples, such as bringing Indigenous speakers, scholars, artists and educators to campus. Other goals were to create opportunities for community engagement, develop a foundation for supporting Indigenous students, faculty, and staff, and developing strong ties with local indigenous people [in order to] set goals collaboratively. Others were more honor based, such as creating a Gustavus/Dakota land monument or sacred space on campus.
“We that we are gathered here today on the homeland of the Dakota people, who have endured hardships and broken promises, that have experienced genocide and were driven out of their home…We [are here to] honor their history and their talents, gifts and contributions… ”
In relation to the creation of a land monument, one has been in the talks within the PCIR committee due to the donation of the class of 2021’s senior gift. “The Senior class that graduated last spring dedicated their senior class gift to the work of indigenous relations, and we are responsible to spend that money in a way that was intended by the class and we [understand] that and [it] was discussed in the PCIR. How I would describe their intentions right now is that it would need to be grassroots and the wish of the students take priority,” Bergman said. This monument would be in collaboration with an indigenous artist in order to build one on campus.
Additionally, there was some conversation during the forum about the current state of the council’s progress in forming relationships with indigenous people. Presently, there is no collaboration between the PCIR and any member of the Indigenous community as it relates to their current goals or projects, however it was stated that this is subject to change. According to the PCIR, the goal is to “[Bring] in indigenous partners as soon and as often as we can, and build an advisory council instead of one person. It’s not like all Indigenous people think alike…it’s staggering how much diversity there is. In order to stop from falling into the trap of “this is Indigenous”, we need to have a constant ongoing flow of information – this is about relationships, this is about learning; this is a college. It’s not realistic or desirable to be coordinated just with this council, ” Lindqvist said.
“We want to give this work time to mature and gain some momentum, which is the reason why I decided to form a third council, because in order for this type of work to get a boost to start it should be its own standalone thing. Forming relationships with Indigenous nations in our region and with people within that, we don’t know who to ask, or where to go, so in terms of forming relationships it’s not our first step,” Bergman said.
Towards the end of the meeting, it was shared that there is a website in the works from the PCIR full of resources on the work that they are doing as well as ones that relate to Indigenous recognition, such as maps that display which tribe’s historical territory you are living on in order to promote land recognition.
This site is currently under development and, at the moment, is a Moodle page. It features multiple different tabs with different topics as it relates to Indigenous relations, however while this page is open to the public, it is not publicly accessible. If you wish to access this website, you would need to email Ursula Lindqvist in order to request it, and your viewership of this page would not be anonymous.
“…it’s staggering how much diversity there is. In order to stop from falling into the trap of “this is Indigenous”, we need to have a constant ongoing flow of information – this is about relationships, this is about learning; this is a college. It’s not realistic or desirable to be coordinated just with this council,”
The meeting finalized with the council urging the attendees to present their thoughts on what they would like to see on campus in regards to Indigenous relations. If you would like to be in attendance of one of these meetings, the next meeting will be held at 1 p.m. on March 29 in the Interpretive Center, located in the Arboretum.