Reconciliation, Resistance, and Autonomy: Indigenous Archaeologies in the Southern California Coastal Hinterlands
Zoom info:
About the talk:
Practitioners of Indigenous Archaeology advocate for a balanced yet selective incorporation of Indigenous knowledge alongside Western epistemologies and practices - and less frequently - an asymmetrical commitment to Indigenous wisdom and ontologies as the foundation for imagining archaeology as one tool for Indigenous storytelling. This talk is committed to the latter by demonstrating how archaeology guided by Indigenous knowledge and needs can disrupt false simulations of Indigenous peoples in colonial historiography while providing evidentiary lines for Indigenous nations' enduring connections to ancestral homelands. Drawing upon Payómkawichum, Tongva, and Acjachemen collaborators; conceptualization of thrivance, Acebo will present how the Black Star Canyon Village Project (2013-2020) examined the boundaries between resistance and autonomy against different forms of settler governance in Santa Ana Mountains through Indigenous stories supported by archival, lithic, and geochemical provenance analyses. Acebo will close by highlighting how this effort continues under the Enduring Indigenous Homelands Project (2022-Present), which protects sacred places and contributes to state reconciliation efforts.
Practitioners of Indigenous Archaeology advocate for a balanced yet selective incorporation of Indigenous knowledge alongside Western epistemologies and practices - and less frequently - an asymmetrical commitment to Indigenous wisdom and ontologies as the foundation for imagining archaeology as one tool for Indigenous storytelling. This talk is committed to the latter by demonstrating how archaeology guided by Indigenous knowledge and needs can disrupt false simulations of Indigenous peoples in colonial historiography while providing evidentiary lines for Indigenous nations' enduring connections to ancestral homelands. Drawing upon Payómkawichum, Tongva, and Acjachemen collaborators; conceptualization of thrivance, Acebo will present how the Black Star Canyon Village Project (2013-2020) examined the boundaries between resistance and autonomy against different forms of settler governance in Santa Ana Mountains through Indigenous stories supported by archival, lithic, and geochemical provenance analyses. Acebo will close by highlighting how this effort continues under the Enduring Indigenous Homelands Project (2022-Present), which protects sacred places and contributes to state reconciliation efforts.
Information shared in this talk is indebted to the knowledge of and approved by collaborators
from the Payómkawichum (Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians, Cultural Center), Tongva
(Ti’at Society), and Acjachemen (Juaneño-Acjachemen Blas Adobe Culture Center) descendant
communities.
About the speaker:
Nate Acebo is an assistant professor of anthropology and Native American and Indigenous studies (NAISI) at the University of Connecticut. He currently serves as the associate director of Native American and Indigenous Studies at UConn, where he is responsible for building Indigenous curriculum and Native community inclusion programs with/for the five tribal nations of Connecticut. Acebo practices CBPR-based Indigenous archaeology with the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians, Tongva and Kanaka Maoli communities, and his research focuses on anticolonial resistance networks, place-name mapping, and land tenure systems in Southern California and Hawaii. Acebo was the University of California Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Fellow and Critical Mission Studies Fellow at UC Merced and UC San Diego from 2020-2021, and a Mellon Foundation Faculty of Color Working Group Fellow in 2022-2023.
Nate Acebo is an assistant professor of anthropology and Native American and Indigenous studies (NAISI) at the University of Connecticut. He currently serves as the associate director of Native American and Indigenous Studies at UConn, where he is responsible for building Indigenous curriculum and Native community inclusion programs with/for the five tribal nations of Connecticut. Acebo practices CBPR-based Indigenous archaeology with the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians, Tongva and Kanaka Maoli communities, and his research focuses on anticolonial resistance networks, place-name mapping, and land tenure systems in Southern California and Hawaii. Acebo was the University of California Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Fellow and Critical Mission Studies Fellow at UC Merced and UC San Diego from 2020-2021, and a Mellon Foundation Faculty of Color Working Group Fellow in 2022-2023.
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