CBC Online Event
Indigenous Perspectives on Environmental Justice
Friday, April 9, 12:20 p.m.
Author Dina Gilio-Whitaker (Colville Confederated Tribes) will discuss her research from her book As Long as the Grass Grows: The Indigenous Fight for Environmental Justice from Colonization to Standing Rock. She is the policy director and a senior research associate at the Center for World Indigenous Studies and teaches at California State University, San Marcos.
Contact Cristina Cardona: caardona@ccbcmc.edu
Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81904277383?pwd=czFSc0dIbWdVYWtjOUtyRDEwL1J2UT09 Meeting ID: 819 0427 7383 Passcode: PBK9b2
Environmental Justice Websites
- Learn About Environmental Justice
Environmental Protection Agency - The Environmental Justice Movement
from NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) - Environmental Justice in the 21st Century: Toxic Waste and Race
Environmental Law Institute, October 10, 2018
Online From CCBC Libraries
Our Roots Run Deep As Ironweed by
Motivated by a deeply rooted sense of place and community, Appalachian women have long fought against the damaging effects of industrialization. In this collection of interviews, sociologist Shannon Elizabeth Bell presents the voices of twelve Central Appalachian women, environmental justice activists fighting against mountaintop removal mining and its devastating effects on public health, regional ecology, and community well-being. Each woman narrates her own personal story of injustice and tells how that experience led her to activism. The interviews--many of them illustrated by the women's "photostories"--describe obstacles, losses, and tragedies. But they also tell of new communities and personal transformations catalyzed through activism. Bell supplements each narrative with careful notes that aid the reader while amplifying the power and flow of the activists' stories. Bell's analysis outlines the relationship between Appalachian women's activism and the gendered responsibilities they feel within their families and communities. Ultimately, Bell argues that these women draw upon a broader "protector identity" that both encompasses and extends the identity of motherhood that has often been associated with grassroots women's activism. As protectors, the women challenge dominant Appalachian gender expectations and guard not only their families but also their homeplaces, their communities, their heritage, and the endangered mountains that surround them.30% of the proceeds from the sale of this book will be donated to organizations fighting for environmental justice in Central Appalachia.
Publication Date: 2013
The Political Economy of Environmental Justice by
The environmental justice literature convincingly shows that poor people and minorities live in more polluted neighborhoods than do other groups. These findings have sparked a broad activist movement, numerous local lawsuits, and several federal policy reforms. Despite the importance of environmental justice, the topic has received little attention from economists. And yet, economists have much to contribute, as several explanations for the correlation between pollution and marginalized citizens rely on market mechanisms. Understanding the role of these mechanisms is crucial to designing policy remedies, for each lends itself to a different interpretation to the locus of injustices. Moreover, the different mechanisms have varied implications for the efficacy of policy responses--and who gains and loses from them. In the first book-length examination of environmental justice from the perspective of economics, a cast of top contributors evaluates why underprivileged citizens are overexposed to toxic environments and what policy can do to help. While the text engages economic methods, it is written for an interdisciplinary audience.
Publication Date: 2012
Standing Our Ground by
Standing Our Ground: Women, Environmental Justice, and the Fight to End Mountaintop Removal examines women's efforts to end mountaintop removal coal mining in West Virginia. Mountaintop removal coal mining, which involves demolishing the tops of hills and mountains to provide access to coal seams, is one of the most significant environmental threats in Appalachia, where it is most commonly practiced. The Appalachian women featured in Barry's book have firsthand experience with the negative impacts of Big Coal in West Virginia. Through their work in organizations such as the Coal River Mountain Watch and the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, they fight to save their mountain communities by promoting the development of alternative energy resources. Barry's engaging and original work reveals how women's tireless organizing efforts have made mountaintop removal a global political and environmental issue and laid the groundwork for a robust environmental justice movement in central Appalachia.
Publication Date: 2012
Oceti Sakowin
- Belonging to the Oceti Sakowin Nation
Native Knowledge 360
Environmental Justice History
- Principles of Environmental Justice
from People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit - Environmental Justice History
in AVoice: African American Voices in Congress
Native Americans and Buffalo
- Native Americans Have General Sherman to Thank for Their Exile to Reservations
History, October 28, 2018 - 'Kill Every Buffalo You Can! Every Buffalo Dead Is an Indian Gone'
The Atlantic, May 13, 2016
The Book
As Long As Grass Grows by
Through the unique lens of "Indigenized environmental justice," Indigenous researcher and activist Dina Gilio-Whitaker explores the fraught history of treaty violations, struggles for food and water security, and protection of sacred sites, while highlighting the important leadership of Indigenous women in this centuries-long struggle. As Long As Grass Grows gives readers an accessible history of Indigenous resistance to government and corporate incursions on their lands and offers new approaches to environmental justice activism and policy. Throughout 2016, the Standing Rock protest put a national spotlight on Indigenous activists, but it also underscored how little Americans know about the longtime historical tensions between Native peoples and the mainstream environmental movement. Ultimately, she argues, modern environmentalists must look to the history of Indigenous resistance for wisdom and inspiration in our common fight for a just and sustainable future.
Publication Date: 2019
Natural Resource Management by Bunky Echo-Hawk
Dakota Access Pipeline
- Illinois Indigenous and environmental groups call Biden administration to shut down Dakota Access Pipeline expansionDaily Northwestern, March 2, 2021
- Biden shutting Dakota Access pipeline would cause food prices to spike
Fox Business, February 13, 2021 - North Dakota oil prices surge and output stalls as pipeline's fate awaited
Reuters, February 10, 2021 - Key Moments In The Dakota Access Pipeline Fight
NPR, February 22, 2017
from MSNBC
Women and Environmental Justice
- Being Idle No More: The Women Behind the Movement
Cultural Survival Quarterly Magazine, March 2013
Dina Gillo-Whitaker on Social Medii
Other Books by Dina Gilio-Whitakei
All the Real Indians Died Off by
Unpacks the twenty-one most common myths and misconceptions about Native Americans In this enlightening book, scholars and activists Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz and Dina Gilio-Whitaker tackle a wide range of myths about Native American culture and history that have misinformed generations. Tracing how these ideas evolved, and drawing from history, the authors disrupt long-held and enduring myths such as- "Columbus Discovered America" "Thanksgiving Proves the Indians Welcomed Pilgrims" "Indians Were Savage and Warlike" "Europeans Brought Civilization to Backward Indians" "The United States Did Not Have a Policy of Genocide" "Sports Mascots Honor Native Americans" "Most Indians Are on Government Welfare" "Indian Casinos Make Them All Rich" "Indians Are Naturally Predisposed to Alcohol" Each chapter deftly shows how these myths are rooted in the fears and prejudice of European settlers and in the larger political agendas of a settler state aimed at acquiring Indigenous land and tied to narratives of erasure and disappearance. Accessibly written and revelatory, "All the Real Indians Died Off" challenges readers to rethink what they have been taught about Native Americans and history.
Call Number: E76.8 .D85 2016
News on Environmental Justice
- Biden places environmental justice at the center of his sweeping efforts
Washington Post, January 28, 2021
On the Shelf at CCBC Libraries
Environmental Racism in the United States and Canada by
From Flint, Michigan, to Standing Rock, North Dakota, minorities have found themselves losing the battle for clean resources and a healthy environment. This book provides a modern history of such environmental injustices in the United States and Canada. From the 19th-century extermination of the buffalo in the American West to Alaska's Project Chariot (a Cold War initiative that planned to use atomic bombs to blast out a harbor on Eskimo land) to the struggle for recovery and justice in Puerto Rico following Hurricane Maria in 2017, this book provides readers with an enhanced understanding of how poor and minority people are affected by natural and manmade environmental crises. Written for undergraduates as well as the general reader with an interest in social justice and environmental issues, this book traces the relationship between environmental discrimination, race, and class through a comprehensive case history of environmental injustices. Environmental Racism in the United States and Canada: Seeking Justice and Sustainability includes 50 such case studies that range from local to national to international crises. Provides comprehensive coverage and analysis of the far-reaching specter of environmental racism in the U.S. and Canada, using numerous case studies that extend across the U.S. and Canada from the 19th century into the present day Examines the confluence of climate change, natural resource conflicts, political and corporate corruption, and racism Reflects a regional arrangement to better highlight patterns and types of injustices as well as victims Is written by a prolific author and expert on environmental and Native American issues
Call Number: GE230 .J65 2020
Our History Is the Future by
In 2016, a small protest encampment at the Standing Rock reservation in North Dakota, initially established to block construction of the Dakota Access oil pipeline, grew to be the largest Indigenous protest movement in the twenty-first century, attracting tens of thousands of Indigenous and non-Native allies from around the world. Its slogan "Mni Wiconi" Water is Life was about more than just a pipeline. Water Protectors knew this battle for Native sovereignty had already been fought many times before, and that, even after the encampment was gone, their anti-colonial struggle would continue. In Our History is the Future, Nick Estes traces traditions of Indigenous resistance leading to the #NoDAPL movement from the days of the Missouri River trading forts through the Indian Wars, the Pick-Sloan dams, the American Indian Movement, and the campaign for Indigenous rights at the United Nations. While a historian by trade, Estes also draws on observations from the encampments and from growing up as a citizen of the Oceti Sakowin (the Nation of the Seven Council Fires), making Our History is the Future at once a work of history, a personal story, and a manifesto.
Call Number: E99.D1 E87 2019
A Terrible Thing to Waste by
A "powerful and indispensable" look at the devastating consequences of environmental racism (Gerald Markowitz) -- and what we can do to remedy its toxic effects on marginalized communities. Did you know... Middle-class African American households with incomes between $50,000 and $60,000 live in neighborhoods that are more polluted than those of very poor white households with incomes below $10,000. When swallowed, a lead-paint chip no larger than a fingernail can send a toddler into a coma -- one-tenth of that amount will lower his IQ. Nearly two of every five African American homes in Baltimore are plagued by lead-based paint. Almost all of the 37,500 Baltimore children who suffered lead poisoning between 2003 and 2015 were African American. From injuries caused by lead poisoning to the devastating effects of atmospheric pollution, infectious disease, and industrial waste, Americans of color are harmed by environmental hazards in staggeringly disproportionate numbers. This systemic onslaught of toxic exposure and institutional negligence causes irreparable physical harm to millions of people across the country-cutting lives tragically short and needlessly burdening our health care system. But these deadly environments create another insidious and often overlooked consequence: robbing communities of color, and America as a whole, of intellectual power. The 1994 publication of The Bell Curve and its controversial thesis catapulted the topic of genetic racial differences in IQ to the forefront of a renewed and heated debate. Now, in A Terrible Thing to Waste, award-winning science writer Harriet A. Washington adds her incisive analysis to the fray, arguing that IQ is a biased and flawed metric, but that it is useful for tracking cognitive damage. She takes apart the spurious notion of intelligence as an inherited trait, using copious data that instead point to a different cause of the reported African American-white IQ gap: environmental racism - a confluence of racism and other institutional factors that relegate marginalized communities to living and working near sites of toxic waste, pollution, and insufficient sanitation services. She investigates heavy metals, neurotoxins, deficient prenatal care, bad nutrition, and even pathogens as chief agents influencing intelligence to explain why communities of color are disproportionately affected -- and what can be done to remedy this devastating problem. Featuring extensive scientific research and Washington's sharp, lively reporting, A Terrible Thing to Waste is sure to outrage, transform the conversation, and inspire debate.
Call Number: GE230 .W375 2019
