THE ROOT | Episode 1 | Racism As A System

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In The Root Episode 1: Racism as a System, Dominique Drakeford speaks with scholars and academic activists Nikki Sanchez and Lisa Betty on the importance of dismantling colonial systems and reclaiming the fullness of Native American & Afro-Indigenous history as a regenerative framework for liberation and true sustainability across every industry.

NIKKI SANCHEZ

Nikki Sanchez is a Pipil/Maya and Irish/Scottish academic, Indigenous media maker, environmental educator and community organizer. She holds a master's degree in Indigenous Governance and is presently completing a Ph.D. with a research focus on emerging visual media technology as it relates to Indigenous ontology. Nikki's first book, Spirits of the Coast - An Anthology of the Salish Sea Resident Orca Whales - was just released by the Royal BC Museum. Nikki's most recent project is the 8-part documentary VICELAND series “RISE” focused on global Indigenous resurgence. RISE was debuted at Sundance in February 2017 and has received global critical acclaim, recently winning "best documentary" at the Canadian screen awards.

Images below curated by Nikki Sanchez

  1. US Foreign Policy: From this Medium Article, an infographic that demonstrates the US intervention into Latin American democracy and sovereignty in order to facilitate cheap labor and trade policies from these so called "developing nations". It is this type of illegal and often genocidal intervention that fuels much of the North American fashion industry's ability to generate huge profit with little overhead for labor and raw materials. 

  2. Decolonize Head to Head Oka Meme: This photo was taken at the height of the Oka crisis in 1990. Oka was a critical standoff between the Mohawk nation and the Canadian Government where more military troops where deployed against the Mohawk's than have ever been deployed internationally. Since then, Mohawk warrior imagery has been a symbol of Indigenous Resurgence across Turtle Island. 

  3. Buffalo Mountain: As part of the genocidal efforts in Canada, there was a bounty put on the head of Buffalo in the plains. This policy led to a near complete extinction of the Buffalo in the prairies, weakening the plains tribes and forcing them into participation in capitalism as a primary economic system. This picture is just one example of the many extreme measures that were taken to exterminate and undermine the Indigenous peoples in what is now known as Canada. 

  4. NSRGTS image: look from NSRGT's Indigenous owned fashion brand. Much contemporary Indigenous streetwear integrates traditional design principles with functional frontline/revolutionary function. 

  5. Make your Grandma Proud:  Indigenous futurism image by Tomahawk Bang.

  6. Spirits of the Coast (Nikki's recent book)

Links to Nikki’s work:

LISA BETTY

Lisa Betty is a Ph.D. Candidate in History at Fordham University. She teaches on themes of labor, migration, and diaspora in the Americas, the Caribbean, and Africa. Lisa's dissertation research contributes to the growing body of scholarship on the Caribbean diaspora, with a focus on Jamaican migrants, in Cuba and the United States from the 1930s through the Cuban Revolution. She has worked in the field of nonprofit advocacy serving in organizations that advocate for children, families, immigrants, and incarcerated people, and leads antiracist teaching workshops. Proud of her family's southern and Jamaican roots, Lisa contributes to the development of safe, sustainable, and healing spaces for Black and Brown people.

Images below curated by Lisa Betty

Library of Congress archives, original captions were not altered:

  1. “Three women and one man hoeing in field”

  2. “[The Georgia Negro] Condition of 300 Negro farm tenants after 1 year's toil, 1898.”

  3. “Board of directors of the Coleman manufacturing co., Concord, N.C., the only Negro cotton mill in the U.S.”

  4. “Coleman Manufacturing Co., a Negro operated cotton mill, Concord, N.C.”

  5. “A Carib Indian woman of Martinique in native dress”

  6. “Agricultural. Mexican cotton pickers. Surrounded by the soft white cotton blossoms whose harvesting is essential to America's war effort, this Mexican girl takes a moment's rest from her strenuous picking job. She's one of hundreds of Good Neighbors who gave a helping hand to the farmers near Corpus Christi, Texas, by harvesting the summer cotton crop”

  7. “A typical home of Jamaica negro, Bog Walk, Jamaica, W. I.”

  8. “Natives bartering for Jamaica sugar in the Mandeville market, Jamaica”

  9. “Little Jamaican water carriers, near May Pen, Jamaica”

Links to Lisa’s work:

This week’s episode is sponsored by:

Fibershed develops regional and regenerative fiber systems on behalf of independent working producers, by expanding opportunities to implement carbon farming, forming catalytic foundations to rebuild regional manufacturing, and through connecting end-users to farms and ranches through public education.

LEARN MORE ABOUT FIBERSHED HERE >

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Planet, Circular Economy, Waste, Style, Farming, People, The Root, Season 4Kestrel Jenkinsethical fashion, future of fashion, conscious style, ethical style, fashion revolution, ethical fashion podcast, sustainable fashion, garment industry, transparency, who made my clothes, circularity, the root, racism as a systemComment