Jane Addams Senior Caucus will be closed on Monday, October 11th to recognize Indigenous Peoples Day. While the celebration of Native peoples and their contributions cannot be limited to a single day, we recognize Indigenous Peoples Day is a day to honor that we reside on stolen land and to celebrate the voices of Native People.
Recognizing what was the formerly known as Columbus Day instead as Indigenous People’s Day is a declaration to take back a “holiday” that falsely celebrates an explorer who incited the attempted genocide and colonial oppression of an entire population that caused deep traumatic wounds and the erasure of Native voices.
Chicago, formerly known as Zhigaagong (pronounced 'Zhi-Gaa-Goo'), is located on ancestral lands of indigenous tribes, such as the Council of the Three Fires--comprised of the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations--as well as the Miami, Ho-Chunk, Menominee, Sac, Fox, Kickapoo, and Illinois Nations. Chicago today has the third-largest urban Indian population in the United States, with more than 65,000 Native Americans in the greater metropolitan area with 175 different tribes represented.
RECOGNIZE INDIGENOUS LANDS
Chicago Land Acknowledgement Resolution
Support the landback movement, follow and/or donate to Indigenous organizers NDN Collective.
LEARN
Read—and share!—the Indigenous Peoples Day Toolkit from nonprofit IllumiNative, a comprehensive resource that also includes advice on subjects such as, "how to respond to opposition against Indigenous Peoples Day."
Read work created by those who identify as Indigenous, such as best-selling writer Tommy Orange, author of National Book Critics Circle Award winner There There, and Poet Laureate Joy Harjo, the first Native American with that title. Check out our list of 31 Native American writers, too.
Support Redhawk, who is committed to helping represent and support practitioners of traditional art forms. They also offer courses in these disciplines to keep them alive. They work to expand the notion of native art to encompass and celebrate modern work, too. “It seems that America has finally allowed Indigenous people to move into the 21st century,” says Matias.
Buy and stream music from artists of Native descent. Matias and O’Loughlin were both quick to offer suggestions of artists to check out, including genre-bending rapper Princess Nokia, Academy Award-winner Buffy Sainte-Marie, as well as groups like Peace Poets and A Tribe Called Red.
TAKE ACTION
Donate to Chi-Nations Youth Council: The Chi-Nations Youth Council is happy to announce that after years of hard work and dedication, Alderman Carlos Ramirez-Rosa has Provided city-owned land located in Albany Park at the southeast corner of Wilson and Pulaski to the North American Indian Community for a First Nations Garden to be owned and maintained by The Chi-Nations Youth Council. This space will be used not only as a teaching garden for the 35th ward community but as a healing space for the Urban Native Community of Chicago.
Consider donating to the Native Voter Fund to aid registration efforts, outreach, and protection against voter suppression.
Pictured above:
Ramapough Lenape Nation Chief Dwaine Perry, center, speaks as members of the The Indigenous Peoples Day New York City Committee held a Circle of Belonging in Columbus Circle on June 30, 2020, in New York City. The group's long-term goal to remove the statue at Columbus Circle and change Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples Day has been reignited by the current protests against racism.
PHOTO BY BYRON SMITH/GETTY IMAGES