Started: Feb 2020
Workshops were free to the public and a new registration will be available later in the year to join Workshop-Three that has been postponed due to COVID-19. Here is the link to the past registration: https://bit.ly/2ROpDov
About this Event
The One Book, One Philadelphia selection, There There, showed how historical Indigenous erasure—the deliberate and systematic destruction of cultures and violent displacement of peoples—continues today.
The Counter Narrative Society (CNS) and collaborators led a workshop series that explored the history and impacts of pan-Indigenous erasure here in Philadelphia. Dialogues centered the lived, hyper-present experiences of Lenni-Lenape today—whose traditional homeland is where Philadelphia now stands—as well as the experiences of Taino (Indigenous Caribbean) and other Native communities living in the region. Non-Native participants were invited to listen, learn, and join in collaborative conversations about healing.
Overview
WORKSHOP ONE: PHILADELPHIA in LENAPEHOKING
Saturday, February 1, 1:00 PM at Penn Treaty Park and FISHTOWN COMMUNITY LIBRARY
This workshop begun at what is now Penn Treaty Park, a significant place where the Great Elm Tree of Shackamaxon once stood and where many sachems of the Lenni-Lenape and other tribes from the Lenapehoking territory met for council. Then the conversation continued at the Fishtown Community Library, and it was guided by Nanticoke Lenni-Lenape voices and opened up to all pan-Native experiences as well.
WORKSHOP TWO: TAINO IN LENAPEHOKING
Saturday, February 22, 1:00 PM at KENSINGTON LIBRARY
This workshop focused on the Taino Arawak peoples who are indigenous to the Caribbean and have made huge contributions to modern society yet they and their descendants continue to experience cultural erasure, including here in Philadelphia’s Boricua community. This workshop explored Taino culture, with conversations guided by contemporary Taino and Lenape experiences as well as by Native communities in the diaspora.
WORKSHOP THREE: SOUTH PHILLY IN LENAPEHOKING
Saturday, March 14, 1:00PM at SOUTH PHILADELPHIA LIBRARY
*** THIS WORKSHOP HAS BEEN POSTPONED DUE TO COVID-19. MORE INFO WILL BE PROVIDED AT A LATER THIS YEAR. ***
Participants will engage in conversation with members of Philadelphia’s Lenape, Taino, pan-Native, and Italian American communities and explore the impacts of Indigenous erasure through complicity with settler colonization, as well as what can be done to repair wrongdoings and support the existence of Indigenous futures.
Workshops have been facilitated by TRINITY NORWOOD, MABEL NEGRETE (CNS) and PRISCILLA BELL. Events were open to the public via registration.
Photo of Trinity Norwood by Zein Nakhoda.