Planning Through Land Acknowledgments

Planning Through Land Acknowledgments - Episode 2: History

July is the month Independence Day here in the United States and so we were thinking a bit on topics that might be relevant from an allyship perspective and ended up having an interesting conversation about land acknowledgments. In the greater Seattle area where we live, we’ve seen them become more common, especially with local arts organizations. We’ve seen organizations like Real Rent Duwamish come into existence as a way to channel some of this energy.

As we went to try and find a podcast episode that might do a good job of discussing land acknowledgements and the pros/cons, it’s perhaps funny that the best one we found was a very Canadian centric podcast series, but we felt like the material was just as relevant for us here in the U.S.

The series is called Planning Through Land Acknowledgements from a woman named Emma Nelson. It’s a four episode series from 2020 -> and we actually listened to the short into episode (4 min) and then most of the History episode (40 min).

Suggested discussion questions (if you need something to start the conversation):

• Where have you seen land acknowledgments happening? Have you seen in any in your place of work or school?

• Have you found land acknowledgments to be useful or more performative in nature?

• In our discussion we tended to land on the point that acknoweldgement without action felt more performative and empty… but what does action even mean or look like in this case? Or perhaps better said, what kinds of actions do you think should accompany a land acknowledgment?