Land Acknowledgment

let us consider the earth

upon which we touch with our feet and shape with our hands:

some say we can own it and lend it

we can certainly steal it, or share it

we can make a home for ourselves or others

we occupy the land, with gentleness or with violence

all oppressed people have a right of return to their home

we as a nation have done an injustice to those who originally called this land home:

The City of Chicago is located on land that was majority swamp and prairie with a soil composition heavy in clay deposits. It is and has long been a center of trade and collaboration for Native peoples. The area is the traditional homelands of the Anishinaabe, or the Council of the Three Fires: the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations.

to the land: we may cultivate, tend, and learn from it

we can degrade it, strip it, erode it.

with it we can create.

to it, someday, we will all return.

let us now listen to it.