One of our key areas of focus at the Cultures of Resistance Network is confronting injustices against indigenous peoples and promoting cultural survival. Whether in the villages of Nigeria, the Brazilian rainforest, or the mountains of Pakistan, our network has long worked with partners who are standing with indigenous communities as they face threats from industrial infrastructure, mining, and other major corporate and government projects.
Often, indigenous communities are the victims of mainstream visions of “development.” The construction of mines, mega-dams, and plantations often means that the long-time stewards of the land are displaced. Human and environmental exploitation often go hand in hand—for example, when rainforests are cleared to make way for monoculture crops or rivers are polluted by oil drilling. The resulting loss of cultural and linguistic diversity is equally dramatic, as indigenous peoples abandon their languages and customs to assimilate in cities. The UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues estimates that 90 percent of the world’s languages are at risk of disappearing in the next 100 years, the majority of them spoken by indigenous peoples.
The CoR Network is proud to partner with a wide range of allies to advance campaigns for Indigenous rights around the world.
[Featured image courtesy of Cultures of Resistance Films.]
