The Mattaponi River, considered by the Mattaponi Tribe in Virginia to be the place where life begins, will be impacted by a proposed reservoir and dam project that will pump water from the river and could damage its ecosystem.
Nowhere north of the Valley of Mexico is there a more robust expression of prehistoric Native American culture and religion than in the ceremonial mound complexes of the Mississippian culture.
The Wolf River, its watershed, and the surrounding hill country have been used by generations of Sokaogon peoples for activities that pass on traditions and sustain their community’s identity. These activities include religious observances at Popple Pond and Oak Lake and gathering pure water from springs for use in water ceremonies.
Construction of an astronomical observatory threatens the integrity of Mount Graham, Ariz., sacred to the San Carlos and White Mountain Apache. This ironic conflict pits the Vatican against Apache spiritual leaders, and astronomers against biologists.
Sixty miles south of the Zuni Pueblo in New Mexico lies Salt Lake, home of the Zuni’s Salt Mother deity. When water evaporates in the summer, it leaves a layer of salt on the lake bottom, which is harvested by pilgrims, including medicine men coming from Zuni and other neighboring tribes.
The Black Hills stretch across western South Dakota, northeast Wyoming and southeast Montana and constitute a sacred landscape for the Lakota, Northern Cheyenne and Omaha.
A world-famous natural bridge located at the northern edge of the Dine (Navajo) Nation, Rainbow Bridge is the site of hundreds of thousands of tourist visits every year and is recognized as a National Monument.
Snoqualmie Falls, 30 miles east of Seattle, Washington, is sacred to the Snoqualmie Tribe of the Puget Sound region. They believe it is the place where First Woman and First Man were created by Moon the Transformer, himself the son of an Indian woman and a star.
The wetlands around Lawrence, in eastern Kansas, hold over a hundred years of memories of Native children forced to grow up in isolation from their families and cultures. These memories bear their traces in unmarked child graves and a medicine wheel erected by contemporary Haskell students.
What was once Quechan land is now prime gold mining territory, and the off-reservation sacred landscape around Indian Pass in the California desert is endangered.