Land Acknowledgment Statement

ᏣᎳᎫᏪᏘᏱ Tsalaguwetiyi (Cherokee, East)

WHY IS INDIGENOUS LAND ACKNOWLEDGMENT IMPORTANT?

“It is important to understand the longstanding history that has brought you to reside on the land, and to seek to understand your place within that history. Land acknowledgements do not exist in a past tense, or historical context: colonialism is a current ongoing process, and we need to build our mindfulness of our present participation.” Northwestern University

“When we talk about land, land is part of who we are. It’s a mixture of our blood, our past, our current, and our future. We carry our ancestors in us, and they’re around us. 

As you all do.” Mary Lyons (Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe)

As such, we recognize this land and the surrounding waterways for their significance to the Cherokee peoples who came before us and those that still inhabitant the land today. We honor with gratitude the land itself and the Cherokee peoples.

Christmount is on the unceded ancestral land of the first people of the Swannanoa Valley & Blue Ridge Mountain region - the Cherokee. We honor the legacy and the history of these tribes – past, present, and future.

We stand in solidarity with these tribes and we invite our peers in the summer camp & youth development industries to join us in continuously acknowledging the Native inhabitants of the land we are on. This community of people is still here through continuous resilience and resistance to systemic efforts to silence voices and erase history.

(Many thanks to Camp Fire of the Central Puget Sound for their example in this acknowledgement.)