ABOUT THE NATIVE LAND INFORMATION SYSTEM
The purpose of the Native Land Information System (NLIS) is to compile, consolidate, and visualize data and information that Indigenous peoples of North America need to protect their lands and resources and plan for the future.
Overview of the Native Land Information System (NLIS)
The Native Land Information System (NLIS) was developed by the Native Lands Advocacy Project (NLAP); a project of Village Earth, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization based in Fort Collins, Colorado, with funding from the Indian Land Tenure Foundation. The NLIS serves as a repository of learning resources, information, and data to help defend and protect Native lands for the benefit of Native peoples. The NLIS also aims to challenge the status quo of historical data colonialism in the United States.
"The colonial world is a world divided into compartments...Yet, if we examine closely this system of compartments, we will at least be able to reveal the lines of force it implies. This approach to the colonial world, its ordering and its geographical layout will allow us to mark out the lines on which a decolonized society will be reorganized."
Table of Contents
This quote by Fanon adequately summarizes the strategy of the Native Lands Advocacy Project. For the Indigenous peoples of North America, these “compartments” refer to the reservation, the district, the allotment, the township, the section, and the tract. All of these compartments serve as wedges to divide Native peoples by superimposing a land tenure system that understands land purely as a commodity and detached from a cultural or spiritual connection. It is a land tenure system that places primacy on the Western construct of the individual and nuclear family, which over time grinds away at the bonds of extended families, bands, and tribes, and prevents the development of alternative land uses and views. In brief, it is a historically-constructed colonial system that continues to destroy Native rights to live on their land as they see fit.
Another key term in Fanon’s quote is “system.” The “system” cannot be revealed by looking at each compartment individually. Rather, we must step back and examine how all the compartments connect over time to reveal the underlying system. This leads us to an important goal of the NLIS: we present the data on Native lands in aggregate and within a historical context. By understanding the “system” and how it works in detail, we can develop more effective strategies to transform the system into a support structure that ultimately promotes the well-being and sovereignty of Native peoples.
Click here to learn more about our position on data sovereignty!
Empowering Native Control of Land Through Data
"[D]ata are the building blocks of good governance; however, equal access to these data is not guaranteed. Tribes may not have ready access to the data collected by external agents about their citizens, lands, and resources, which underscores the need for tribal protection, ownership and application of tribal data",
Much of the data about Native lands and Native peoples is collected and maintained by the United States Government. However much of this data is not readily available to Tribes and Native peoples.
Established in 1824, the US Bureau of Indian Affairs is responsible for the administration and management of 55 million surface acres and 57 million acres of subsurface minerals estates held in trust by the United States for American Indian and Alaskan Native Nations. Despite this huge responsibility, there is very little transparency or accountability when it comes to the BIA’s performance as Trustee.
According to the most recent evaluation of BIA’s responsibilities, a 2009 Program Evaluation of the BIA Realty and Trust Program conducted by the Department of Interior’s office, the Inspector General acknowledged that “The BIA Realty and Trust Program plays a key role in keeping the DOI promise ‘to protect and improve the trust assets of American Indians, Indian tribes, and Alaska Natives.'” Yet, the Inspector General excoriated the Bureau for its continued failure to develop meaningful performance measures. Specifically, the report states that in “Real Estate Services, acquisition and disposal of land, and lease compliance activities are significant functions that also lack measures.”
The failure of the BIA to provide even basic information about leasing and transactions of Native lands makes public scrutiny of these programs difficult, if not impossible.
Our Two Areas of Focus
Consequently to the above, most data available at the national scale reflects the colonizer’s mindset and attitudes towards natural resources.
Ideally, available land use data would reflect local and culturally-specific perspectives specific to each Native Nation. This data does not currently exist for All Native Lands. Therefore, our focus on compiling available public data is part of the larger individual effort in which Tribes are engaged to produce their own data. However, due to the limitations of existing data at that scale, we are left with few options but to use existing datasets, despite their limitations. An important part of our approach is to try and look at these colonized datasets from a different angle, process them in a way that brings more clarity, insight, and understanding into Native land history and structural inequality, and inform alternative design.
Generally, throughout the site, you will find that the Native Lands Advocacy Project mostly focuses on two primary areas:
- Documenting the history of Native land oppression in the United States
- Providing data support for sustainable planning on Native land
Disclaimer
This site, including all data dashboards, maps, and raw data, is intended for reference purposes only. Much of the data housed on this site are from the United States Government and/or third party sources, as such, Village Earth, the Native Lands Advocacy Project and its partners makes no warranties or claims about its accuracy or completeness. Additionally, the information presented here should not be considered authoritative or superior in any way to the data, knowledge, information and oral histories of Native peoples and/or Tribes as it relates to their lands and communities.
Our Commitment
- To approach our work with a good heart by always doing our best to honor Indigenous peoples, inherent sovereignty, and ways of knowing
- To critically and carefully weigh the value of a particular data set for promoting Native peoples vs. how that data might compromise a community’s privacy and right to opacity.
- To support Native research capacity-building
- To license our data products using the Creative Commons “Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike” so it can be shared
but not be used for commercial purposes. - To practice a forward-thinking methodology geared towards constantly improving datasets
- To participate in changing the perception of Native land through data
NLAP Team
David Bartecchi
Executive Director of Village Earth & Director of NLAP
David has over 20 years experience working in Indian Country with a focus on Indian Land Tenure, Community Mapping, Bison Restoration, and challenging the numbers used by HUD in the Indian Housing Block Grant (IHBG). He received his M.A. in Anthropology from Colorado State University in 1998 and has served as Executive Director of Village Earth since 2008.
Aude Chesnais, Ph.D.
Research Director
Aude (pronounced "Ode") is a political ecologist and Director of Research for the Native Land Information System. She has worked for over 12 years on issues of sustainable land use and food-systems on tribal land, with sustained collaboration with Lakota communities in South Dakota, US. Her work bridges qualitative research with GIS technology, data visualization and decolonial methodologies to design locally useful research that supports indigenous innovation and sovereignty. She is particularly interested in regenerative food-systems and how innovative research design can support the just transition to build climate resilient sovereign economies.
Chase Christopherson
Agricultrue & Natural Resources Specialist
Chase is from Eden Prairie, MN and is an enrolled member with the Mandan tribe of the Three Affiliated Tribes. He has a M.S. in natural resource sciences from North Dakota State University in 2022, where he conducted research on the recovery of soil and vegetation following reclamation on degraded lands. He has a background in land and tribal resource management research and planning. He is particularly interested in identifying trends in tribal and federal documents, filling data gaps and making the necessary data accessible to improve tribal land management and further tribal self-governance and determination.
Vivian Delgado, Ph.D.
Climate Specialist
Vivian Delgado, Ph.D. holds a doctorate degree in Native American Philosophy and Higher Education. Dr. Delgado developed a four-year degree program in Indigenous Studies at Bemidji State University where over 70 students have received bachelor's of science major and minor degrees in Indigenous Studies. Along with her work for Village Earth, she consults with the International Indian Treaty Council and Oceti Sakowin Treaty Council. In addition to Engineers Without Borders USA where she opens their boards meetings with blessings, land acknowledgement and directed Sacred Ecologies.
Raven McMullin
Researcher/Writer and Outreach Coordinator
Raven is from the Navajo reservation in Twin Lakes, NM. She received her B.A. in Political Science with a minor in Legal Studies from Colorado State University in 2020, and is now pursuing her master's in public policy at Arizona State University. She has a background in community outreach and tribal advocacy, and is passionate about contributing to NLAP's mission to present accessible and reliable data tools for tribes to utilize at their own discretion. Raven is helping NLAP to contextualize the maps, data, and dashboards housed on the NLIS.
Emma Scheerer
Researcher/Writer
Emma is a writer and researcher who believes in the practical power of words to transform us and our world. She received her B.A. in Writing & International Studies from George Fox University and has bylines in publications including Oregon Humanities and Northwest Review. She has a background in human rights advocacy, copy editing, and research related to Oregon and California native lands. She is Chetco & Tolowa Dee-ni’.
Sponsors
