FIELDNOTE MAR 29 2023
We started our time at Naluwan with some morning dance moves to warm up our bodies. It was pleasant to see the elders actively participating in the exercise.
Fieldnote Apr 12 2023 - 1:34pm
For this visit, Juanjuan and I were grouped with five grandmothers, three from the previous visit and two new grandmothers due to the absence of our classmates.
Fieldnote Feb 21 2023 - 10:56pm
Driving through the small alley of the place where the Amis live felt odd as the modern view on my left - wind turbines, bridges, was a vast contrast from the view on my right which saw village-lik
Navajo Nation (Diné Bikéyah), USA: Setting
Thomas De PreeOn July 16th 1979, the largest by volume radioactive spill in US history took place in Church Rock (Kinłitsosinil), which is located in the southeastern “checkerboard area” of the Navajo Nation (Diné Bikéyah) and northwestern New Mexico. Due to a breach in the former United Nuclear Corporation’s uranium mill tailings dam, an estimated ninety-four (~94) million gallons of radioactive, toxic, and highly acidic effluent spilled into the Puerco River (Brugge et al. 2002; SRIC 2009).
The Church Rock Uranium Mill Tailings Spill marked the disastrous beginning of the end for the uranium mining industry in the Navajo Nation and New Mexico. Ironically, the spill occurred on the very same day as an event 34 years prior that marked the beginning of the uranium boom and the dawn of the atomic age: the Trinity Test of July 16th 1945, “the day the sun rose twice.” (Szasz 1984) Unlike the world’s first nuclear explosion in southern New Mexico, the Church Rock mill spill remains relatively underreported and has not yet registered at a national scale of collective memory.
Beyond Environmental Injustice Research and Teaching Collective
A collaboration with diverse environmental justice educators to build teaching and learning capacity across borders, linking K-12 schools, universities, community-based organizations and government
Red Water Pond Road Community, Church Rock, Navajo Nation (Diné Bikéyah), USA
On July 16th 1979, the largest by volume radioactive spill in U.S. history took place in the southeastern “checkerboard area” of the Navajo Nation (Diné Bikéyah) in northwestern New Mexico.
A statue is built in the middle of the walkway that separates the river and the land that the Amis lives on.