Wednesday, April 16, 2014

"Walking in Balance: Native Reflections on the Climate Crisis"

David Brule,
Strong Oak and David Brule, Board member of the Nolumbeka Project, will narrate stories and visions of walking in balance with Nature that are all but lost in our money-driven society.

Wendell Free Library
Friday, April 18 7 PM
7 Wendell Depot Road,
Wendell, MA 01379



Annual Pow-Wow at UMass-Amherst


Monday, April 14, 2014

Join Us Tonight in Greenfield to Protect Native American Burials

Burial Ordinance Still Being Blocked in Greenfield

Join us tonight, Monday, April 14, at 6:30 p.m., as the Greenfield Appointments and Ordinance Committee meets at 114 Main St. in the Planning Department office. They will be voting on a number of new ordinances that have come before them.   

However, we have no guarantee that they will be voting again on Howard Clark's Burial Ordinance proposal which was introduced almost a year ago.

The committee had already passed the draft ordinance once and recommended it's passage by the full Town Council.  It was then sidetracked into unproductive meetings without ever coming to up for a Council vote! 

This is the 50th anniversary of the passing of the Civil Right Bill. It should  have given equal rights to all ethnic groups -- including the basic right of sanctity of human burials.  There is no accounting for the attitudes of racism that still exist in so many subtle ways in society today. 
 

The Nolumbeka Project wants to challenge the Ordinance Committee to move on a vote of the original draft.  Please come and support us at this meeting.    There is power in the presence of numbers of us joining together to demand Protection for the Ancestors at White Ash Swamp and other Native American burials in Greenfield.

Thursday, April 10, 2014

Spirited "Conversations for Racial Justice" Event Draws Nearly 100

Photo Courtesy Sharin Alpert, Mass Slavery Apology
A spirited gathering of nearly one hundred people gathered at the First Congregational Church to hear Nolumbeka Project President Joe Graveline's presentation of "Franklin County's First Peoples: History, Heritage and Current Events" on Saturday, April 5.

The talk and discussion was the April event in the monthly series "Conversations for Racial Justice" sponsored by Mass Slavery Apology. Reflecting the title of the series, the meeting became highly interactive as members of the audience challenged everyone present to take a deeper look at the material presented, to appreciate more fully the deeply emotional nature of some of the events described, and to carefully examine the language we use for examples of unconscious racial and gender bias.

Photo Courtesy Sharin Alpert, Mass Slavery Apology
There is no doubt that any honest account of the history and current reality of this region's First People is deeply disturbing.  The pervasive cultural bias that propelled a pattern of genocide echoes to this day.  Joe's presentation drew the line from the Great Falls Massacre, though Vermont's sterilizaton laws, through his own childhood account of the racism that his family encountered bccause of the color of his mother's skin, to the events today that threaten to once again descecrate the Native American remains at Greenfield's White Ash Swamp and other Sacred Native American sites.

As the formal presentation ended, the conversations continued in small groups in the church's parish hall.  As Joe has often said,  "We need to have these conversations."

As the Spring unfolds there will be time for action as well.  Want to help?  Please Contact Us!


For more information on Mass Slavery Apology

Website:http://www.massslaveryapology.org/index.htm

Email: email@massslaveryapology.org

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