Cheyenne water-spirit knowledge was dismissed by lawyers until an elder’s armed stand

Evidence

Environment, culture, religion, and life are very much interrelated in the tribal way of life. Indeed they are often one and the same. Water, for example, is the lifeblood of the people. I recall taking a draft tribal water code for public input into the five villages on my reservation when I was a tribal sociologist. Protection of the water spirits was a major concern throughout the reservation. And the water spirits varied depending on the water source being a river, lake, or spring. I reported back to the attorneys, and they laughed at my findings. However, it was no laughing matter a few years later, when an elderly Cheyenne man held off the drilling team of ARCO from crossing his water spring with his rifle. “Today is a good day to die,” he said as he held his own hunting rifle before him. — Winona LaDuke, All Our Relations, 466

Categorization

• XREF: Water spirits vs. water rights is a rich case for Reading the Landscape’s listening/observation-as-method and eco-justice pedagogy: whose knowledge counts when defining a resource.
• QUESTION: What does the elder’s ‘good day to die’ invocation of Cheyenne sacrifice say about sovereignty-as-willingness-to-die vs. legal process?