Washington State University Vancouver hosts Interdisciplinary Social Justice Conference

Washington State University Vancouver’s Native Programs and the Collective for Social and Environmental Justice (csej-wsu.org) are hosting their fourth annual Social Justice Conference on the theme of “Native Sovereignty, Decolonization, Divestment, Reparations and Environmental Justice: Constructing Coalitions at the Intersections.” The conference is from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. April 21 and from 9 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. April 22. All sessions will be held over Zoom. Registration is required at labs.wsu.edu/sjcon-wds/2023/03/28/sjcon/. The event is free and open to the public.

The conference program features speakers and roundtable panels investigating the intersection of Native, BIPOC and environmental justice issues, especially in the Pacific Northwest. The conference welcomes public dialogue about the enduring impacts of the 19th century Morrill Act, which “redistributed nearly 11 million acres” of Indigenous land. Program panels include:

• Salmon Scam: Criminalization and Exoneration of Native Fisher People
• Indigenous Traditional Ecological and Cultural Knowledge: Decolonizing Academia and Nurturing Healthy Futures Through First Foods and Plant Relatives
• Missing and Murdered Indigenous People: Fossil Fuels, Man Camps and a Case for Divestment, Reinvestment and Reparations
• Indigenous/Black Solidarity: From AIM and the Black Panthers to Standing Rock and the George Floyd Uprising
• Speaking to the Gap: Health Disparities and Death in Indian Country
• With a screening and discussion of “Atomic Bamboozle,” a documentary that follows activists as they expose the true costs of new small nuclear reactor designs