Translated as “Young lady of Sololá” or “Beauty of Sololá”, Q’opoj Tz’olojyá is a tradition that has been maintained for over 40 years in the department of Sololá, Guatemala. It is not a beauty contest rather a competitive recognition of the strongest and well-rounded Indigenous women of Sololá.
UMass Boston’s Institute for New England Native American Studies (INENAS) and Suffolk University Law School’s Indigenous Peoples Rights Clinic are pleased to announce a year-long, statewide project, Massachusetts Native Peoples and the Social Contract: A Reassessment for Our Times. Supported by a grant from Mass Humanities, the two organizations will host four roundtable discussions and listening sessions in areas of the state with substantial Native American populations.
On July 10 Asociacion Sobriviviencia Cultural brought to a close several fruitful days of radio-to-radio exchange in Alta Verapaz. This project was carried out with the generous support of the Swift Foundation and with volunteers from Radio Planeta in San Marcos, Guatemala. An experienced team of the radio program staff and volunteers collaborated to visit Radio Kamalb’e located in the rural community of Chantaca, Radio Nimlajacoc from the community of Nimlajacoc and Radio Tzuu Talq’a in the community of Chisec.
On June 30, 2015 the Municipality of Palin, Escuintla, Guatemala inaugurated a new street in the city named after respected Maya Poqomam political leader and indigenous rights activitist, Marcelino Moscut. Moscut was a well-known community leader who fought for various issues effecting Indigenous communities and was a passionate advocate for the Community Radio Movement. He passed away exactly a year ago on June 30, 2014 and his hometown of Palin honored this day by naming one of their main streets after him.
On June 9th and 10th, 2015, Asociación Sobrevivencia Cultural (ASC), Cultural Survival’s sister organization in Guatemala, conducted a two-day exchange among seven community radios from El Salvador and Guatemala. As part of a generous grant from the Swift Foundation, ASC selected four community radios in Guatemala to travel to El Salvador and visit, as well as learn about the work of, three community stations in El Salvador.
By Erika Mayer
On May 26, 2015, the Passamaquoddy and Penobscot Tribal delegates—Matthew Dana II and Wayne Mitchell, respectively—withdrew from the Maine legislature. Their reasons for doing so were a long list of grievances against the state of Maine involving fishing rights and, by extension, rights to Tribal sovereignty. These violations of Penobscot and Passamaquoddy rights undermined what should have been an equal, not subordinate, relationship with the state.
On June 11 and 12, 2015, Asociacion Waqib’ Kej hosted the Third Annual Indigenous Youth Gathering in Chimaltenango, Guatemala. These events target Indigenous youth to discuss the current political situation of Guatemala and the role Indigenous youth have and will continue to play. A fourth gathering is scheduled to be held in the western region of the country next month.
On April 25th, 2015, a 7.6-magnitude earthquake hit Nepal. It caused a death toll of over 10,000 people, injured over 30,000 people, and destroyed thousands of homes and buildings. Three weeks later, a 7.3-magnitude earthquake killed at least sixty-five people in Nepal and seventeen people in India, injured thousands, and brought down buildings that were weakened by the first quake. The United Nations estimates that the earthquakes have affected approximately eight million people.
Reconocimiento de tierra
Reconocemos que nuestra sede está en la tierra de Massachusetts, en Cambridge, MA, y agradecemos a los administradores Indígenas pasados, actuales y futuros de este territorio.
