Land Tenure and Livelihoods of the Oglala Lakota - Kathryn M ...

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Stromberg 12 my family there, got married there, we use the land for raising horses and gardening...I have a wind generator and four solar panels but no resources to hook them up...I built my home out there from scratch.” Others repeated this association between self-reliance and traditionalism, and between dependency and assimilation: “there's a more sense of responsibility when you're living there on your own land. In cluster housing, they exist on whatever they can panhandle. It‟s broken their sprits. Poverty is tough, and poverty is tougher when you don‟t even have a say so on the things that could make your life better, like owning your own land.” The loss of food sovereignty during the reservation period is also related to this theme. Many feel that physical constraints of cluster housing limit the food production that can be done by individuals. "Recently they got stricter in the cluster housing, they weren‟t going to allow animals, livestock...which is kind of sad because in the housing, its those people who need to learn how to grow a garden” a Wounded Knee woman told me. Some perceive that this makes cluster housing residents more dependent on federal and tribal aid programs. A Sharps Corner man told me "I think these cluster housings, they just kind of enable all these people there to do nothing, because they're relying on different programs to come up with the food or whatever. I think if people just kept their land and move out on them, they could have a garden. But these cluster houses are so close together, you open your door and you‟re staring at the other people‟s door, there's no room for gardening. So everyone just sits back, waiting for a handout.” The loss of local food production, especially regarding produce, is an issue closely related to the relationship between commodity food and the swift rise in diabetes and obesity rates. In fact, the idea that recovering food sovereignty could act as a remedy for many of the tribe‟s troubles was repeated frequently. Interviewees felt that in addition to improving nutrition and limiting reliance on commodity food programs, gardening could reduce depression rates and
Stromberg 13 restore pride to many individuals in the tribe. Many specifically referenced bison ranching as a restoration of Lakota values through food production, since the animal was a chief food source before the arrival of cattle and Euro-American style ranching, and added that if they had the capacity to use their land for agriculture, ranching bison would be their preference. One landowner said, "and maybe with that 1000 acres, we'll run buffalo. And with them, we'd have enough buffalo to create our own packing plants. And with that buffalo, we'll feed everybody. We‟ll be able to say, it‟s ours. It doesn‟t belong to the government, the B.I.A., the tribal government, it belongs to us.” The issues of traditionalism versus assimilation, living on allotments versus living in cluster housing, and the reclamation of practical food production are all closely related to land use on the reservation in the minds of many natives. Future Direction of Research This report, after heavy augmentation with further analysis of the interview process, will serve as the primary research component of a senior honors thesis in Environmental Studies. Other sections to be added will include perspectives of tribal members on various power relations related to land use within the reservation setting, and implications of the research as regards solutions to some of the land tenure problems on the reservation, highlighting the substantial role of non-profit organizations. This primary research section will be complimentary to the thesis, the bulk of which will be comprised of secondary research. Focus will be on the historical and cultural context of the reservation‟s land, especially the federal government‟s interactions with the tribe, administration of the reservation, and creation of a tribal government. Current statistics on the socioeconomic status of Pine Ridge residents will be used, including agricultural data and household survey data obtained from anthropologist Kathleen Pickering of
Page 1 and 2: Stromberg 1 Methods Land Tenure and
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Page 11: Stromberg 11 H.U.D.‟s policy of c
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