The Decolonial Atlas

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Category: Indigenous Perspectives

May 12, 2018May 16, 2018decolonialatlas

Mexico City’s Buried History

January 20, 2018February 4, 2018decolonialatlas

Minneapolis–St. Paul in Dakota and Ojibwe

October 12, 2017October 12, 2017decolonialatlas

Coming Soon: Indigenous Names for Cities of Turtle Island

September 13, 2017November 5, 2017decolonialatlas

Unangam Tanangin – The Aleutian Islands

July 26, 2017July 26, 2017decolonialatlas

Tongva Sites of Los Angeles

June 26, 2017July 26, 2017decolonialatlas

Hunkpapa maps of the Battle of Little Bighorn

June 5, 2017June 5, 2017decolonialatlas

The Transformable Orientations of Tuareg Mapping

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More than 3,100 migrants died crossing Mediterranean in 2017. People should not have to put their lives at risk to cross imaginary borders. https://buff.ly/2IUTxWp
Baltic Tribes circa 1200 CE The Baltic region of Europe (modern Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Kaliningrad Oblast of Russia, and Poland) circa 1200 CE. The Baltic tribes of this era practiced various forms of paganism about which little is known today. Beginning in the 13th century CE, Christian crusaders from Denmark, Sweden, and Germany invaded the Baltic region, converting tribes in what was one of the last parts of Europe to be Christianized. European people are indigenous people. In the words of Ward Churchill, “Euro-Americans are indigenous people too. Not here, but they’re indigenous to somewhere with indigenous traditions and understandings of the land. They need to get back in touch with that. They must recover that which has been taken from them in the process of colonization, taken in the same fashion that things are being taken from us, now.” #Historical #Region #Europe
Cavelandia – The Yuchi Homeland Cavelandia is a region of extraordinarily karst topography across the modern states of Tennessee, Alabama, Kentucky, Virginia, and Georgia. Tens of thousands of caves lie beneath the surface, including Mammoth Cave – the longest in the world. In the Yuchi language, this area is known as S’akabaha, meaning “Cave land.” The Yuchi, who call themselves Tsoyaha, or “Children of the sun,” are one of the original inhabitants of this region. Indeed, “Cavelanders” was once a common appellation for the Yuchi people. Caves were a central part of Yuchean spirituality, and dozens of caves in S’akabaha contain ancient glyphic inscriptions, the most common of which is that of the Tso (the sacred sun symbol). There is little doubt that the Yuchi played a large role in these cave inscriptions. The elder’s traditions describe initiatory rites performed in caves, and the priests often retired to the caves to journey to the lower worlds. Important Yuchi leaders were also often interred in caves after their deaths. These caves are very sacred to the Yuchi, and must be protected. Map by Woktela D.K. Hackett, Yuchi Tribal Historian, and Jordan Engel For more information on the Yuchi, visit https://buff.ly/2LjTy2M or https://buff.ly/2LjTyji #Bioregional #DecolonialAtlas #Originals #IndigenousPerspectives #Region #NorthAmerica
"Nationalism, in my opinion, is nothing more than an idealistic rationalization for militarism and aggression." - Albert Einstein
Global Agriculture: Where, What and How We Grow⠀ ⠀ This series of maps comes from National Geographic’s “A Five-Step Plan to Feed the World.” The maps detail in what ways we can be more efficient about where we grow, what we grow, and how we grow.⠀ ⠀ Where Agriculture Exists: Pasture vs. Cropland. Source: https://buff.ly/1POYu0E⠀ ⠀ We can no longer afford to increase food production through agricultural expansion. Nearly all new food production in the next 25 years will have to come from existing agricultural land.⠀ ⠀ How Our Crops Are Used: Food vs. Feed and Fuel. Source: https://buff.ly/1POYu0E⠀ ⠀ Only 55 percent of food-crop calories directly nourish people. Meat, dairy, and eggs from animals raised on feed supply another 4 percent. It would be easier to feed the planet if more of the crops we grew ended up in human stomachs.⠀ ⠀ Where Yields Could Improve. Source: https://buff.ly/1POYu0E⠀ ⠀ Improving nutrient and water supplies where yields are lowest could result in a 58 percent increase in global food production.⠀ ⠀ All maps and graphics: Virginia W. Mason and Jason Treat, NGM Staff. A World Demanding More, source: David Tilman, University of Minnesota. Agriculture’s Footprint, source: Roger LeB. Hooke, University of Maine. Maps, source: Global Landscapes Initiative, Institute on the Environment, University of Minnesota.⠀ ⠀ #CurrentIssues #World
#Cymru (#Wales) in #Cymraeg (#Welsh) ⠀ ⠀ #IndigenousPerspectives #Europe
This is the Mercator projection. You know, the one that usually makes Greenland appear as big as Africa. Except this version has shifted the North Pole to the "Equator," thus changing the relative size of the continents. To be clear, South America is not actually larger than Asia. The Mercator projection is just really really bad at representing area.⠀ ⠀ via /u/YoureTheVest & r/MapPorn
Extermination of American Bison to 1889⠀ ⠀ Source: https://buff.ly/2IN5Lw0⠀ ⠀ The American bison, the largest living land animal on the continent, came dangerously close to extinction at the hands of settlers. Prior to colonization, it is estimated that there were about 60 million bison across Turtle Island. By 1870, there were only 5 million, and in 1889, at the height of the great bison slaughter, there were less than 1,000 living individuals. Today, the American bison population is growing again, with approximately 30,000 bison living on public lands, and 500,000 on non-public lands.⠀ ⠀ #Historical #Region #NorthAmerica #TurtleIsland
Non-Native Plant Species in North American Forests⠀ ⠀ source: https://buff.ly/2IICORX⠀ ⠀ Colonization can be a biological process as well a cultural one. As Europeans settled Turtle Island, they brought their entire ecosystem with them, introducing scores of non-native species to the continent. A non-native species is a species living outside its native distributional range, which has arrived there by human activity, either deliberate or accidental. Non-native species which are harmful to a local ecosystem are called invasive species. The term “invasive” is used for the most aggressive species. Although the numbers vary widely, some of the current research estimates that there are approximately 50,000 non-native species in the United States today. However, of that 50,000 species, approximately 4,300 are considered invasive species [1]. These species grow and reproduce rapidly, causing major disturbances to the areas in which they are present, and threatening biodiversity. Approximately 42% of threatened or endangered species are at risk due to non-native, invasive species [2].⠀ ⠀ [1] https://buff.ly/2IN5d9q⠀ [2] https://buff.ly/2s4AC17⠀ ⠀ #CurrentIssues #Region #NorthAmerica #TurtleIsland
2/2 Pre-Christian Religions of Europe Around the Time of Jesus⠀ ⠀ Balkan – Dacian (Zalmoxianism), Thracian, and Illyrian polytheism, and Albanian mythology.⠀ Baltic – Latvian (Dievturi), Lithuania (Romuva), and Prussian (Druwi) polytheism.⠀ Basque – Basque mythology.⠀ Berber and Punic – Traditional Berber religion, and Punic religion.⠀ Celtic – Celtic polytheism (the religion of the druids), and the syncretic Gallo-Roman polytheism.⠀ Germanic – Old Norse (Forn Sed), Continental Germanic (Irminism), Anglo-Saxon (Fyrnsidu), and Gothic polytheism.⠀ Hellenistic – The Roman religion (Religio Romana), the Roman Imperial Cult, the Ancient Greek religion (Hellenismos), the Luwian religion, the Eleusinian Mysteries, the Dionysian Mysteries, and Orphism.⠀ Iranian – Zoroastrianism, Mithraism, the Sarmatian religion, the Scythian religion (Uatsdin), the Mesopotamian religion, and the syncretic Zoroastrian-Armenian polytheism.⠀ Sami – Sami shamanism, animism and polytheism.⠀ Semitic – Judaism, Semitic polytheism (including the Canaanite religion and the Nabataean religion).⠀ Slavic – The Slavic religion (Rodnovery).⠀ Uralic – Finnish (Suomenusko), Estonian (Maausk), and Hungarian (Ősmagyar Vallás) polytheism.⠀ ⠀ Christianity gained converts through the work of missionaries like Saint Patrick, through royal decree like Constantine’s Edict of Milan, and by force as in the Northern Crusades. By the Middle Ages, so entrenched was Christianity in Europe that the continent was commonly referred to simply as Christendom. But the Christianization of Europe was not as absolute as many now think. Pagan traditions survived independently for centuries in some places long after they had been officially Christianized. True to its etymology, pagans found refuge in rural areas. Some of the later attempts to extinguish the remnants of indigenous religion in Western Europe include The Spanish Inquisition and the witch hunts of the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries. In Northern Scandinavia, traditional Sami religion was never fully eradicated and its practice continues today. For other traditions whose lineages were broken, the new generations that have begun to revive them are collectively calle
1/2 European Paganism and Christianization - The spread of Christianity throughout Europe⠀ ⠀ In contemporary conversations about decolonization, this is a point which is often overlooked – Europeans are indigenous too. Before the spread of Christianity, Europe was home to a profusion of religious beliefs, most of which are pejoratively referred to as paganism. The word derives from the Latin paganus meaning ‘of the countryside,’ essentially calling them hicks or bumpkins. Some of these pre-Christian belief systems are listed below.⠀ ⠀ A note on the categorization – Indigenous religions are, by their nature, nebulous and dynamic. Unlike the relatively uniform Christian Church, indigenous religions have no codified dogmas and no universally ordained ways to worship. Celtic polytheism, for instance, was less of a religion in the modern sense and more of a spectrum of beliefs and practices. The Celtics tribes in Ireland, Gaul, and Galatia may have had some common rituals and an overlapping pantheon of gods, but they were also influenced by neighboring traditions and their local environments.
Comparative Latitudes⠀ ⠀ The Equator divides the Earth into Northern and Southern hemispheres. The hemispheres are in many ways opposites. They have reverse prevailing winds, ocean currents, direction of storm rotation, apparent path of the sun, and seasons from one another. Even the stars in the night sky are different. But when all that is put aside, distance from the Equator (in either hemisphere) is also a critical factor effecting climate, culture, and more.⠀ ⠀ Northern and Southern biomes often mirror each other. For instance, hot deserts mostly exist between 30° and 50° north and south, and tropical rainforests between 0° and 10° north and south of the Equator. While there are strikingly few species that span both hemispheres outside of the tropics, there are many analogs. The South has penguins and the North has auks. The tallest tree in the South, the eucalyptus, and the tallest tree in the North, the sequoia, both live about 40° from the Equator. In this sense, the hemispheres provide a fascinating laboratory of different ways life has adapted to similar climes, like separate worlds sharing the same planet.⠀ ⠀ The map of at the top of this article is an equal-area Gall-Peters map which takes all the land in the Southern Hemisphere (except Antarctica) and drops it in the oceans of the Northern Hemisphere. Relative latitude is preserved, but the landmasses are placed at random meridians. Since land makes up only about 29% of the Earth’s surface, it could easily be rearranged to fit into one hemisphere. Seen like this, our planet seems smaller, and its most distant lands suddenly appear at eye level.⠀ ⠀ Comparative Latitudes maps by Jordan Engel can be reused under the Decolonial Media License 0.1.⠀ ⠀ #Alternative #Projections #Decolonial #Atlas #Originals #NonNorth #Orientation #Region #World
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