![]() ![]() It is history, it is identification, it is relationship, and it forms a fundamental part of who we are as a people. Territory, then, is much more than property. It demands that people develop an aesthetic sensibility that one gains only when he lives in one place for a long time. If someone has money, he or she can immediately own a property but the acquisition of territory requires that one live with and on earth. It implies a closeness and an intimacy that is a product of experience, history and time It is not the result of land deeds, laws or other artifacts of a legal system. Territory implies a connection with the earth that is emotional, personal and extra-legal. The concept of territory, however, fundamentally challenges this idea of land as an economic asset to be profited from. Land is considered to be a solid investment something that gains value over time and helps us build equity. To most Americans, the idea that land cannot be bought or sold is almost heretical. If we do not own the freshness of the air and the sparkle of the water, how can you buy them?” But how can you buy or sell the sky? the land? The idea is strange to us. He wrote, “the President in Washington sends word that he wishes to buy our land. He is most famous for a letter that he wrote to the then President of the United States who was negotiating (forcing) his tribe to sell their land. Property is something that can be bought and sold and in is an outward and visible sign of an alienated mode of existence because land that can be sold, is often considered nothing more than another product that exists for our own uses and purposes.Ĭhief Seattle was an indigenous chief from the western part of what is now the United States. In most parts of the industrialized world, one does not hear talk of territory, but rather of property. This fluidity of movement is also reflected in how we speak of the land where we live. This mobility implies a lack of an intimate and spiritual relationship with a specific land, community, and territory that is necessarily built through the patience and dedication of living and rooting one´s self in place. In our highly mobile society, the concept of freedom is tied to the ability to move and settle anywhere one chooses. ![]() What Is Territory and Sense of Place?ĭue to our mobile nature, very few Americans have any sort strong self-identification rooted in a particular place or territory. Most commonly, jobs are centered in the major urban areas of our country thus leading to a depopulation of rural, agrarian communities. Those who end up in the same communities where they´ve lived their entire lives are often considered to be backwards while the “upwardly mobile” young people of our nation are those who are willing and able to follow the jobs to wherever they are. Staying in place is often considered to be the sign of a lack of ambition. Over 90% of American youth move away from home by the time they are 27 years old. As young people, we are almost expected to leave the places and the communities where we grew up. We cherish our sense of mobility as one of the most prized aspects of our civilization. While the issue of migration has garnered lots of attention in the current political climate, very few of us consider the internal migration of Americans as the most prevalent type of migration. Between 20, 12 out of every 100 Americans moved to a different community. Our Hyperactive Mobile SocietyĪ 2008 study showed that close to 2/3 of American adults had moved at least once during their lifetimes. Learning how to live in territory and connected to the limitations and possibilities of place is one of our most urgent tasks. While these sorts of territorial limitations may seem to us westerners as undesirable and adverse, indigenous peoples have developed a rich cultural heritage founded on connection to place. Compared to modern-day western societies which are more defined by migrations and mobility, indigenous cultures have their lives and livelihoods demarcated by the specific conditions and context of their places. One of the defining aspects of indigenous cultures around their world is their connection to specific territories where they have lived for hundreds and thousands of years.
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