DOCUMENT: ON_PLACE.TXT O N P L A C E Remarks by Rudolph C. Ryser, Chairman, Center for World Indigenous Studies National Grant-Makers' Annual Conference, Seattle, WA. Edgewater INN, October 27-30, 1994 For all beings on our planet there is no greater pull on the body and the soul than the attraction felt for the earth itself. It is in this place that each precious being develops its community, its way of consuming and producing, its spiritual life. This intimate relationship between being and place, the evolving oneness, that each community of beings has is what we all know as culture--the worship of land, of place. The bear and the salmon alike draw sustenance, spiritual and material, from the great power of this place. The salmon must use speed, stealth and its knowledge of the waters in which it swims to return to its place of birth--at the beginning of a stream. It spends most of its life swimming, living and eating from the ocean, but it always returns to its first place. The bear roams far from its place of birth, yet when it must seek security, sustenance and salmon it returns to the place it knows. Like our brothers and sisters among the bear, Cedar Tree, salmon, the elk, the Vine Maple, the raven, the Alder Tree, the eagle and the beaver, and all the others, we humans must have our place too. The drama of our quest for place has been playing out for thousands of years and is continuing as the central theme of our politics, society and economy even now. Everywhere you look, when human beings are in grave conflict, you can recognize land as the most common first issue of dispute; politics, economics, religion and social differences come after. So powerful is the drive to have land, to have a place, we humans will fight to the death to have it. In the United States there are lots of "haves" and "have-nots." There are those who have good health care, and there are those who have not. There are those who have wealth, and there are those who have not. There are those who have a life without violence, and there are those who have not. All of these divisions signal a grave sickness in the wider society that threatens to break to pieces the social, economic and political fabric of the United States. Underlying all of this division is the greatest division of all: Those who have land, a place, and those who have not. In the State of Washington, when I was a boy, most of the nearly one million citizens owned their place, their land. Now more than half of the state's nearly five million people rent the place where they live and do not own their land. Across the United States this is more or less the case. The more people do not have their place, the more they feel insecure. They feel unable to control their lives. They are increasingly dependent on faceless officials, abstract powers like business and government, and their fears of real and imagined threats grow. They become ripe for deceitful pretenders to power who offer themselves as leaders. The people become tools for tyrants. All people must feel secure in their place lest they become fearful for themselves and a threat to others. Everyone must be guaranteed the right to live freely in their place. They must have a place to which they can return when they have been away; a place to labor, a place to commune and a place to worship. But saying that everyone must have a place is simpler than organizing a way for everyone to have a place. It is to the subject of arranging human affairs for the common good, establishing new methods and applying intellectual and material resources in support of assuring security of place that we must turn our attention. We must open new channels of communications between our different groups and find new approaches to mediating differences. And in all of this we must recognize the importance of individual self-interest as an underlying reality that determines how or whether differences are mediated. It is from Adrian Esquino, the great leader of the Pipil Indians of El Salvador that I draw a final thought for you. Fifteen years ago at a meeting in Australia, a meeting of Indian leaders from the western hemisphere and other leaders of indigenous peoples from around the world, my friend Adrian Esquino grew impatient with the long speeches that seemed to float in the air but failed to rest in the heart. He stood up, all five feet of him, and asked for the floor, careful not to interrupt the last speaker--a great orator from the Quechua peoples of Bolivia. When he won the attention of the chief spokesperson he then made a simple request: "Would it be possible for the speakers to bring their heads out of the clouds and plant their feet on the ground? For it is on the ground that all of our peoples live, and it is from the ground that we are enriched and nourished. We are more likely to make good decisions if we plant ourselves where the people live and leave the clouds to the wind." -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: :: -= THE FOURTH WORLD DOCUMENTATION PROJECT =- :: :: A service provided by :: :: The Center For World Indigenous Studies :: :: www.cwis.org :: ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: Originating at the Center for World Indigenous Studies, Olympia, Washington USA www.cwis.org © 1999 Center for World Indigenous Studies (All Rights Reserved. References up to 500 words must be referenced to the Center for World Indigenous Studies and/or the Author Copyright Policy Material appearing in the Fourth World Documentation Project Archive is accepted on the basis that the material is the original, unoccupied work of the author or authors. Authors agree to indemnify the Center for World Indigenous Studies, and DayKeeper Press for all damages, fines and costs associated with a finding of copyright infringement by the author or by the Center for World Indigenous Studies Fourth World Documentation Project Archive in disseminating the author(s) material. In almost all cases material appearing in the Fourth World Documentation Project Archive will attract copyright protection under the laws of the United States of America and the laws of countries which are member states of the Berne Convention, Universal Copyright Convention or have bi-lateral copyright agreements with the United States of America. Ownership of such copyright will vest by operation of law in the authors and/or The Center for World Indigenous Studies, Fourth World Journal or DayKeeper Press. The Fourth World Documentation Project Archive and its authors grant a license to those accessing the Fourth World Documentation Project Archive to render copyright materials on their computer screens and to print out a single copy for their personal non-commercial use subject to proper attribution of the Center for World Indigenous Studies Fourth World Documentation Project Archive and/or the authors. Questions may be referred to: Director of Research Center for World Indigenous Studies PMB 214 1001 Cooper Point RD SW Suite 140 Olympia, Washington 98502-1107 USA 360-754-1990 www.cwis.org usaoffice@cwis.org OCR Software provided by Caere Corporation