Ute Language Policy

"The voice of the land is in our language."

Tibetans in India - A New Generation in Exile

Dorje was only four years old in 1962 when the Chinese army advanced across the Tibetan frontier into India. In what is now known as the "Assam Incident," the Chinese began shelling the tiny Himalayan town of Bomdila. Dorje's older sister picked him up at school and held his hand tightly as the two of them raced for home.

GfBV - Gesellschaft für Bedrohte Völker

"Cultural and physical genocide must be opposed wherever it occurs."

From Conquest to Counter-Insurgency

Guatemalan Indians have responded to population growth in ways that conflict with the role the state has assigned them.

Clitoridectomy and Infibulation

Clitoridectomy and infibulation, commonly known as female circumcision, are practices found in many African cultures. The reasons for their development are not known. They are deeply embedded, however, in cultures where they occur because they affect the very definition of what it is to be female.

Book Review

I, Rigoberta Menchu Edited and introduced by Elisabeth Burgos-Debray Translated by Ann Wright Verso/Schocken, 1984, $8.95

Chocó Indian Relocation in Darién, Panama

Indian relocation in Central America is a result of the assertion of colonial or national authority over indigenous cultures. In order to avoid violence, native communities have abandoned traditional territories, moving into more marginal areas which are outside the control of the dominant society.

Advances Toward A Miskito-Sandinista Cease-fire

On Monday, April 28, 1985, the Nicaraguan Government released 14 prisoners charged with participation or association with the armed resistance movements, MISURASATA and MISURA.

The Urrá Dam Project in Colombia - Research to Raise Public Awareness

The Sinu River flows down from the mountains of Colombia's northern Antioquia province. It descends through the plains of central Cordoba, passes through the city of Monteria, and spreads into a lowland swamp before emptying into the Caribbean.

The Tribal Lao Training Project

Highland Lao refugees in the United States face serious crises of survival in their new environment. The Tribal Lao Training Project, initiated at the request of the Iu Mien people of Santa Clara County, California, has helped to make them more economically self-sufficient and better able to cope with the complexities of a modern urban setting.

The Politics of Famine in Ethiopia

Last October, Americans became aware of the tragedy taking place in Ethiopia and responded with the largest outpouring of humanitarian assistance in memory. Relief agencies attempted to supply food and assistance to famine victims as quickly as possible; everyone assumed that the famine was the result of a drought - a "natural" disaster.

Solidarity Pact of Indigenous People of Asia and the Pacific

Indigenous people are found in varying numbers in most countries of Asia and the Pacific; throughout the region they have much in common. Most indigenous communities have a basic kinship through their histories, where customs and traditions are defined by virtue of centuries-old relations with land, forests, rivers and society.

Shuar Bicultural Radio Education

Each morning Shuar Indian children in the southern Amazonian region of eastern Ecuador, gather in groups in their respective centros or villages from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. to hear lessons broadcast over the radio, alternately, in Shuar and Spanish from the Shuar Federation headquarters in Sucua.

Pundasyon Hanunoo Mangyan School - Participatory Education in the Philippines

In the Philippines, three Hanunoo communities have initiated an alternative education program to standard Philippine education. It is hoped that an education more sensitive to their culture will enable Hanunoo to develop skills essential for self-determination in their changing world.

Politics at the US Census Bureau

Twenty-nine years after Mrs. Rose Lee Parks ignited the modern Civil Rights Movement by refusing to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama to a white person, the government of the United States, using the Bureau of the Census, is employing its own unique version of "back-of-the-bus" politics to America's ethnic multitudes.

IWGIA - The International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs

The International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA) was founded in 1968 after the 38th International Congress of Americanists met in Stuttgart. IWGIA was formed by a group of anthropologists who had heard disturbing reports of the annihilation of indigenous peoples in South America and decided to fight along with indigenous peoples for their rights.

Guatemala - Everybody's Indian When the Occasion's Right

In highland Guatemala the term "Indian" or indigena is a widely used and locally accepted means of categorizing people. It characterizes highland inhabitants seen in public roles and is generally contrasted with the term Ladino (or non-Indian). The exact sense of the term "Indian" varies, however, according to who is doing the viewing.