Territories of Life: Sources of Biocultural Diversity,
Resilience, and Self-Determination
Langscape Magazine, Volume 13, 2024
Last year, I journeyed to northwestern British Columbia (BC), Canada — my very first trip to that region of the province I have called home for the past two decades. I knew I would find a spectacular landscape of sheer, jagged mountain ranges hugging the valleys of the mighty Skeena and Nass Rivers. And I knew I would traverse the traditional territories of several BC First Nations: among them, the Tsimshian, Gitxsan, Nisga’a, and Wet’suwet’en. What I didn’t know was that along the way I would experience — more powerfully than in most other places I can remember — a palpable sense of the land being embedded in people and people being embedded in the land, in an inextricable link of symbiosis and interdependence.
It began with a bunch of old road maps, which my partner David and I had brought along for navigation. Wrong idea! Looking for “Port Simpson,” as the maps told us? No such place, the road signs objected, head for Lax Kw’alaams. Going to “New Aiyansh”? Follow the signs to Gitlaxt’aamiks instead. On your way to “Moricetown”? That’s actually Witset! And so on.
Place names and road signs in Indigenous languages. Tribal museums depicting through poignant exhibits Indigenous Peoples’ history the way it was and is, despite the ravages of colonialism. Veritable forests of stunning totem poles reaching for the sky on the outskirts of thriving communities. Provincial parks managed and interpreted by First Nations. Indigenous Protected Areas established to safeguard critical salmon habitat. Young men daringly spearfishing salmon from steep rock perches along the banks of fast-flowing rivers. All that and more at every turn — a cornucopia of signs of biocultural vitality that was impossible to miss.
It was breathtaking — as if the whole land vibrated with the imperceptible, yet thunderous sound of a polyphonic Indigenous choir proudly singing, WE ARE HERE!
And then it dawned on us: this was Delgamuukw v. British Columbia territory. This was the land on behalf of which, back in 1997, Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs had won a landmark case in the Supreme Court of Canada that recognized Aboriginal title as an ancestral right protected under the Constitution Act of 1982. Ever since, those First Nations and their neighbors have been reaffirming their sovereignty, rebuilding traditional governance, reestablishing ancestral laws, and resuming sacred responsibilities toward the land. Patiently, tenaciously, they had come home again to the lands they had never left. And it showed!
It was an immense privilege to be there — and serendipitous, too! Just a couple of months before, we had announced the theme for this issue of Langscape Magazine: Territories of Life. And now I was getting a first-hand primer on what “territory of life” means to Indigenous Peoples in Canada! Back home, that invaluable lesson framed my reading of the stories we received on this theme. Those stories taught me more about what individuals and communities around the world are courageously doing to reclaim, defend, maintain, rebuild, and sometimes even (re)imagine their territories of life — the lands and waters that physically and spiritually sustain the people who care for them. This issue of Langscape is the culmination of that learning journey.
In the opening essay, Faisal Moola and Kanna K. Siripurapu delve into the notion of territories of life, exploring the significance of community-led conservation from local to global levels. Their broad-ranging overview spans from the Dunne_Zaa First Nation’s struggle to reclaim stewardship over their traditional territory in northeastern BC to Indigenous-led conservation initiatives all over Canada, to opportunities to advance such efforts globally through international frameworks and policies. This widespread Indigenous movement, they argue, is the fruit of a “radicle revolution”: the hard-won re-emergence of rootedness in place, akin to the germination of a plant’s radicle that digs into the ground to start another cycle of life.
Also in Canada, Alex DePani documents the historical transformations of a Québec watershed located in the ancestral territory of the Kanien’kehá:ka (Mohawk) First Nation. Private settler companies recklessly turned a thriving landscape into a degraded “sacrifice zone” used as a dump for toxic industrial waste. Now some of the Kanien’kehá:ka communities begin to restore their territory of life, bringing it back to health.
In a similar vein, Rehani Tapp, a young Black student from Upstate New York, chronicles her family’s determination to reclaim ancestral gardening, overcoming a stigma that goes back to the dark age of slavery, when their African ancestors were stolen from their homeland — and from the lands they were farming. The family’s backyard becomes their territory of life, in which they (re)learn to grow heritage vegetables, raise chickens, and improve their food security and health. They build community with other Black farmers, and now Rehani hopes to inspire other Black youths and families who had “grown distant from their ancestors’ connections to the land.”
In their photo essay, Manju Maharjan and Yih-Ren Lin train their lens on the Indigenous Tayal people of Taiwan, who are reaffirming their cultural identity and stewardship of the land after a long history of colonization. Due to the twin loss of sense of identity and control over the land, Tayal people had moved away from the mountains, which caused a decline of their place-based traditional ecological knowledge. Now, community members are reclaiming that ancestral knowledge to protect their territory of life and revitalize sustainable agricultural practices — particularly Indigenous millet cultivation — as well as cultural and spiritual traditions that were once inextricably linked to the farming way of life.
While the previous stories illustrate ways in which communities are reclaiming lost connections with their territories of life, in other cases such connections are still present but are put at risk by a variety of outside pressures. Ajinkya Shahane, Pandhari Hekade, Kanna K. Siripurapu, and Prafulla Kalokar tell the story of Gaoli pastoralists of central India, who assert their traditional natural resource governance against “fortress conservation” approaches that seek to exclude them from areas targeted for nature conservation — even though the Gaoli people have cared for these areas for generations and excluding them may be negatively impacting the ecosystems and biodiversity that had long coevolved with them and their cattle.
Elsewhere in India, agro-pastoralists in Rajasthan are fighting to save their territories of life from another unwanted development: “green” energy production. Windmills are taking over their sacred landscapes, known as orans, which the local communities have protected and sustained for centuries. Rudrath Avinashi’s photo essay introduces us to the people, the changes and threats to their customary way of life, and their advocacy for the conservation of these landscapes through ancestral governance systems.
Over in the Ecuadorian Amazon, the Waorani people struggle to protect their territory from the ravages of deforestation and oil and mineral exploitation. Djam Zerrifi, an artist and activist who has lived with and supported the Waorani, shares their plight in her stunning artwork, which poignantly illustrates that these external pressures cause not only attacks on nature but also attacks on the Waorani’s culture, beliefs, traditions, and language. To address these challenges, the community establishes its own school in the forest so that the new generations may learn and flourish while remaining connected to place.
The threat faced by Loktak fishers in Northeast India’s Manipur state is a hydroelectric power project. A barrage turned their “waterbody of life,” Loktak Lake, from one of India’s largest and most productive lakes into a stagnant pond invaded by alien aquatic plants, where fishing is increasingly difficult. The fishers were declared “illegal occupiers” when the government made the lake a strict “protection zone.” Salam Rajesh relates the fishers’ efforts to defend their inherent right to their traditional domain and to apply their traditional knowledge to lake restoration and conservation on their own terms.
Two complementary stories from Papua New Guinea (PNG) illustrate the unique approaches that PNG’s Indigenous Peoples are choosing when confronted with outsiders’ efforts to gain access to their lands. Both the Hewa people William Thomas introduces in his story and the Wanang people and other communities featured in Tanya Zeriga’s and Mavis Jimbudo’s story resist the dominant Western view of conservation for nature’s sake. Their concern is their subsistence and survival, and from that point of view they understand the need to sustain the life systems that sustain them and to resist external exploitation of their lands. They take things into their own hands, whether by establishing Indigenous Forest Steward programs or by adopting legally binding deeds to implement conservation projects on their lands.
As the previous stories exemplify, the impacts of colonialism, assimilation, displacement, and exploitation on Indigenous and local communities are widespread around the world, ultimately prompting efforts to reclaim and defend territories of life. In the next set of stories, on the other hand, we meet communities and individuals who have thus far managed to carry on, relatively undisturbed, with their traditional ways of life and responsibilities. Change is knocking at the door, however, and we learn how people are addressing the challenges that are coming their way.
Ajaz Ahmed takes us to the Hindu Kush mountains of Pakistan to meet the Kalash people, whose nature-based spiritual beliefs have guided them for generations to care for their forested territory of life through a unique traditional management system. Development is encroaching, and the Kalash endeavor to safeguard their way of life by transmitting their culture and their values to the younger generations.
Upon returning to her native Nigeria, Ode Dixon visits with Iya (Mama) David, a remarkable weaver whose artistry is “woven into the very fabric of her surroundings, in a dance with the reeds along the creek.” In this lively photo essay and the accompanying video, we follow the two women into the reed farm that Iya David lovingly tends according to a timeless tradition, and witness the process that takes the reeds from being harvested and dried to being woven into masterful mats that, as Ode puts it, are “a testament to the resilience and beauty of a community deeply intertwined with its environment.”
Shubham A. Agrawal journeys to the forests of central India in search of the legendary Dewari healers, whose ancient healing tradition stems from deep knowledge and stewardship of a territory of life they see not as a resource to be plundered but as a life-giving mother demanding respect and reciprocity. That ethos, explains Shubham, is reflected in every act of these “nature’s choreographers” — each act being imbued with spiritual meaning that has been handed down through generations. Supporting their traditional knowledge means sustaining their vital role as guardians of forest biodiversity.
Alois Porokwa, a Maasai from Tanzania, lovingly introduces us to his community of Emboreet, a village at the foot of Oldoinyo Sambu, a mountain sacred to the local Maasai as an ancestral area with diverse flora and fauna, a wealth of traditional medicines, plenty of water, and the best pastures for Maasai cattle. We learn about some of the spiritual traditions and ceremonies linked to Oldoinyo Sambu and about two remarkable women healers who source their remedies from the mountain. Proud of Emboreet and its territory of life, Alois wishes to see it protected for future generations as a vital part of the community’s heritage.
In another duo of complementary stories, we immerse ourselves in the worldviews of Himalayan peoples, who see mountain landscapes as “enspirited” — owned and governed not by humans but by invisible deities that must be respected and whose earthly dwellings must be protected. David Hecht, working with renowned painter Gyempo Wangchuk on a project in Bhutan’s protected and conserved areas, muses that awareness of this unseen world “suggests a depth of place-based knowing that is . . . unknown to many outsiders.” That knowledge is deeply reflected in Gyempo’s artwork, which also graces our cover.
In turn, Dan Meir takes us to the Hengduan Mountains of southwest China, where Qiangic-speaking people maintain an ancestral bond with their land, culture, and languages, and with the spirit world. Honoring earth spirits as the masters of the land, they see themselves as humble stewards entrusted with land care. Thus far, Qiangic peoples have resisted the lure of “modernity,” but encroachment continues, posing questions as to what the future may hold for them.
Having experienced the destructive effects of encroachment by the outside world, many communities worldwide are now rebuilding the foundations of interconnectedness and interdependence with the more-than-human world. Such is the case of the Nyishi tribal community of Northeast India, which had long coexisted with tigers in a dense tropical forest — until the establishment of a strict tiger reserve. Forced resettlement severed people’s links with both the forest and the tigers. In his story, Upayan Chatterjee recounts Nyishi villagers’ efforts to reconnect with the forest through a hornbill conservation project.
Filmmaker Petna Ndaliko Katondolo, writing with Maurice Carney, brings us an intimate photo and video essay from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In the heart of the rainforest, the Isangi community breaks away from colonial conventions and misconceptions and embarks on a transformative journey to revive Basandja, an ancient code of conduct for caring for the environment and ensuring balance among all living beings.
In Aotearoa / New Zealand, a Māori hapū (tribal kin-community) reestablishes connections with its ancestral land- and waterscapes through an educational program aimed at instilling traditional socio-environmental responsibilities in the younger generations. Suz Te Tai, Kim Peita, and Krushil Watene describe the many facets of this program, which teaches youths about ancestral values and knowledge by taking them out on the land and sea, sharing stories, history, rituals, and hands-on activities, and “harnessing the opportunities for collective human–nature flourishing.”
But how can one rebuild this sense of flourishing when people are forced into migration because their territory of life has become a “territory of death”? That is the troubling question Mario Gerada, writing from the Mediterranean country of Malta which has become a key destination for migrants who make perilous sea crossings by boat, asks in his story. His answer lies in the work he does with those migrants, bringing them together with Maltese in a shared quest for identity that centers around the cultural significance of flowers and herbs and the idea of gardens as “territories of peace.”
Similar sentiments echo in Pa Vue’s powerful poem about her experience as a Hmong immigrant to the United States. Memories of the jungle and “smokey villages nestled in mountaintops” back home mingle with images of the chaparral in her adopted California. Culturally significant food plants — cultivated, foraged, and store-bought — are woven all through the poem. And, with the land in her language and her language in her bones, Pa can proudly say, “I am still Hmong.”
And then there are those cases in which one has to imagine, or reimagine, one’s territory of life through a creative process. Born of Chinese and French heritage and raised in Canada, Chang Liu lacks roots in either of his ancestral places of origin. Can we become rooted anew in a territory of life, he wonders, and if so, how? He finds his way through the rigorous discipline and philosophy of classical Thai dance, whereby the dancer’s own body “becomes a direct link to a vast cultural past and the natural world that nourished it.”
The heroine in Monisha Raman’s fictional story embarks on another kind of quest for a territory of life: irresistibly pulled by a recurrent dream, she travels to Badaga communities in the Nilgiri Mountains of South India in search of a forest in the homeland she has never known. Poignantly complemented by Lakshmi Unnithan’s web extra, which brings us the voices of real-life people in the Nilgiris who seek to protect their sacred groves, Raman’s haunting story culminates in an emotional homecoming, when the forest of her dreams reveals itself through the words of a sage.
Don’t so many of us, disconnected from place, need that homecoming? Former Terralingua board member Bob Weeden once summed it up to me: “Long ago we lived in places, timelessly. Now we live in times, placelessly.” For the future of life — our lives, all of life — on this earth, time to reverse that course. Time to come home again.
Bioculturally yours,
Luisa Maffi
