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To Be a Leaf

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Blech!

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""""Death""""

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belle@lovely-creature.com

New Orleans, LA

The city of New Orleans and surrounding areas is the traditional territory of the Chahta Yakni (Choctaw), Houma, Chitimacha, Acolapissa, Biloxi, and other Indigenous peoples who have stewarded this land since time immemorial. These lands were home to numerous nations before the arrival of Europeans, who used enslaved African peoples to build New Orleans upon their soil. The largest slave markets in the Deep South were in New Orleans, and many local institutions were built by the labor of enslaved peoples and their descendants, who suffered the horrors of transatlantic trafficking, chattel slavery, Jim Crow, and other harms and injustices. These harms and injustices endure in the form of economic gaps and other inequities that Black communities experience today.

Before the city of New Orleans or the state of Louisiana, this land was known in Choctaw as Bulbancha, “the place of other tongues.” It was a place for diverse cultures to come together, for hunting, trading, and sacred rituals. The culture of New Orleans was significantly influenced by the Indigenous heritage of Bulbancha, and the Indigenous peoples of this area continue to leave their mark on the city and community. Governmental, academic, and cultural institutions were founded and are perpetuated on the exclusion and erasure of Indigenous Peoples. Colonialism has sustained oppression, genocide, land dispossession, and involuntary removals of Indigenous Peoples from this place. This statement is a tribute to the original peoples of this land and the sacrifice of those whose labor built this city. Acknowledgment alone is not enough, and Ahribelle pledges to incorporate this commitment into restorative action.

adapted from the NASP 2024 Convention land & labor acknowledgement

click here for a guide on making a land acknowledgement & action plan

click here for educational resources on supporting Native communities

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