NSU advocates for Indigenous students at LC

Lewis & Clark’s Native Student Union (NSU) strives to represent the diversity, history and culture of  Indigenous peoples. As an affinity group on campus, they provide a safe space for those that identify as Indigenous at LC and spread awareness about what it means to belong to that community today.         

NSU Leader Annabelle Rousseau ’23 of the Cheyenne River Sioux tribe, alongside fellow NSU Leaders Jenn Sosa Ramirez ’23 and Alberto Partida ’22, has worked hard to represent the Indigenous community on campus.

“As we all are in a predominantly white institution, it’s incredibly important that Indigenous perspectives are heard and that we maintain a voice (for them) on this campus,” Rousseau said.

With LC’s historical connections to Indigenous harm — its formulation came at the expense of Indigenous peoples who were displaced from their land — Sosa Ramirez believes that representation is important for acknowledging those harms and strengthening the diversity of the overall community.

“I think it’s very important to have that representation at an institution named Lewis & Clark,” Sosa Ramirez said. “For a long time, the names Lewis and Clark have been glorified … but they encouraged a lot of colonization and the killings of Indigenous people.”                            

Sosa Ramirez also noted how people often speak about Indigenous communities as if they are not around today, yet there are more than 5,000 of them around the world and 574 in the United States alone, which equates to 370 million people worldwide.    

“Going into high school and hearing about my own people being talked about in the past tense was frustrating,” Sosa Ramirez said. “This history of violence is still happening today, and I think that’s what a lot of people choose not to talk about.”

The NSU leaders hope that as more students continue to reflect on LC’s history, it will lead to progressive change around campus that can address the mistreatment and discrimination Indigenous communities have faced in the past and still face today. The next step in correcting the harm done by the institution, according to Rousseau, is through transformative justice initiatives that prioritize the needs of marginalized groups.

“I think one of our broad hopes and expectations from this type of information being learned by the student body is that there will be a lot of campus-wide support to perhaps change the name of our institution,” Rousseau said. “One of my personal goals is also to hopefully by my senior year have some kind of scholarship for Indigenous students, specifically ones for the tribes (whose) land we occupy today. Hopefully, that can address and create some transformative justice in the future for this campus especially.”

In their meetings, which take place over Zoom on Wednesdays at 6 p.m., they discuss their experiences as members of Indigenous groups and celebrate different aspects of their cultures. This includes beading — the practice of stringing beads together to make jewelry or other decorative items. Moving forward, however, they would like to host more discussions about serious issues that affect Indigenous peoples around the world.

Ultimately, they want to encourage students around campus to learn more about Indigenous groups so that LC as a community can be more inclusive and understanding of their perspectives.

“I know we’re not here to teach or educate everyone — you should also be educating yourself — but I think it’s also important that people do have questions,” Rousseau said. “And if they want to, we can have meetings surrounding those and just have a discussion. I think that’s super important. I think it’s just a matter of showing up and showing that you do care, essentially.”

If you are interested in attending one of their meetings, you can reach out to NSU at nsu@lclark.edu or follow them on Instagram @lc_nsu for more information.