Who/What is “Indigenous”?

Respecting, growing

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People sometimes ask or wonder about how to be respectful of Native Peoples while desiring to adopt Indigenous ways. I find it helpful to approach the term “Indigenous” in three ways.

First, as some argue, we are all indigenous to Earth. True. We are Earthlings with layers of being that are shared with the rest of life on the planet—e.g., we each carry communities of fungi, viruses and bacteria (microbiomes) that keep us alive. But as a highly active species whose actions affect the ecologies around us and the web of life generally, we have special responsibilities.

We are responsible to live in ways that enhance the wellbeing of Earth and Earth’s entities. We used to live like other animals, sensitive to the wellbeing of the rest of Nature—not taking too much to permanently damage or eradicate other species. Humanity used to treat every entity as a sentient being—tree, rock, waterway, animal, plant—honoring the spirit therein. In recent centuries, we forgot these ways. We got caught up in the entrancing power of our technologies and underdeveloping our capacities for connection to All. (We also forgot how to raise a cooperative human nature, moving instead into cycles of competitive detachment.)

Second, Indigenous Peoples around the world have traditions of cultivating their connectionist wisdom. But even more, they have specific, intergenerational knowledge and knowhow garnered over thousands of years about how to live regeneratively in their particular sacred landscape. They nurture and implement this knowhow, what is often called Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK). The rest of us who are indigenous to Earth have not learned the language and lifeway of a particular landscape which is passed on over hundreds if not thousands of years by living in nested communities. We did not grow up with this wisdom and therefore are not Indigenous in this sense.

As my co-author, Four Arrows (Wahinkpe Topa), and I mention in the introduction to our book, Restoring the Kinship Worldview, misappropriation of Indigenous cultural practices has happened for hundreds of years whereby outsiders mistreat Native Peoples and take their often sacred practices and resources to profit from them. Instead, we all need to honor and support these place-based Indigenous knowledges, not abscond with them. They are critical to saving our species (and many others).

Third, part of Indigenous wisdom we can all take up is the Indigenous, Primal, or Kinship Worldview. This means following the “original instructions” for living according to Nature’s laws—‘the ways things are’ (Manitonquat, a.k.a., Medicine Story).

“Beneath the layers of poisonous miseducation, we are all indigenous creatures, uprooted and displaced.” (Olson, 2012, p. 58)

Because we are indigenous to Earth, we can relearn how to listen to the land, waterways, animals, and plants who have much to teach us about living ecocentrically.

Go outside and listen. Have a conversation with the other-than-human. Come back to your self, your wildness, your oneness with All.

See WorldviewLiteracy.org to see the contrast between manifestations of the Kinship worldview and those of the dominant culture forced on everyone.

**This week you have the opportunity to watch the film, The Eternal Song, and hear discussions about themes of the film every day (June 3-9, 2025) by Indigenous leaders and supporters. Information and registration here.

REFERENCES

Medicine Story (1991). Return to Creation. Bear Tribe Publishing.

Topa, Wahinkpe (Four Arrows), & Narvaez, D. (2022). Restoring the kinship worldview: Indigenous voices introduce 28 precepts for rebalancing life on planet earth. North Atlantic Books.

1. Note that all funds from the few paid subscriptions are donated to EvolvedNest.org (part of KindredWorld.org).