Land Acknowledgement
McGill University is on the traditional territory of the Haudenosaunee and Anishinabeg nations, a place which has long served as a site of meeting and exchange amongst nations.
’L'Université McGill est sur un emplacement qui a longtemps servi de lieu de rencontre et d’échange entre les peuples autochtones, y compris les nations Haudenosaunee et Anishinabeg. McGill honore, reconnaît et respecte ces nations à titre d’intendant traditionnel des terres et de l’eau sur lesquelles nous nous réunissions aujourd’hui.
As caretakers of this land we are trying our best to not only care for this land but also work on ourselves. How can we be more inclusive and aware? Although this map from https://native-land.ca is not perfect, it does allow us to continue the conversation about why we do land acknowledgements. For starters, instead of just inserting a paragraph at the bottom of our page, we wanted to create this space to focus on increasing awareness of Indigenous presence and land rights. So how do we as a team go beyond just a written acknowledgement? Well, if we look at this project, it was created with the understanding that the land must be protected and cared for. We think this project is pretty cool because we're attempting to interweave Indigenous Wisdom with Scientific Knowledge. For one, we are spreading organic native seeds but then also using SM4 devices to record bird calls!