Black Indigenous Ecologies

3 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

This undergraduate seminar examines Black and Indigenous relationships to land and water, emphasizing the central role of the environment and ecological knowledge in struggles for liberation, self-determination, and sovereignty in the United States. How did the land aid enslaved peoples navigating a way towards freedom? How did the tidewaters of the Chesapeake protect Native tribes from the violence of settler colonialism? And, of course, in what ways have these communities defended the land in return? With particular attention to the Chesapeake Bay region, students will have the opportunity to expand their knowledge of the rivers, forests, and other more-than-human beings around them. At the same time, they will analyze how racism, settler colonialism, eurocentrism, heteropatriarchy, and capitalism have historically and contemporarily dominated ecological knowledge—shaping these environments, along with the entire Earth. Ultimately, through the ecological practices and ancestral knowledge of Black and Indigenous communities, the course will ask students to consider new pathways towards liberated and sustainable futures.