ONLINE COURSE
Re-Indigenizing: Practices for Decolonizing and Re-Rooting
Awaken your connection to the web of life through calling in your own ancestral roots, visiting the past to inform the future.
Overview
A’ida Al-Shibli, an indigenous Bedouin born in occupied Palestine who has lived in Tamera for the last 2 decades, invites you to explore how and why systems of oppression intend to cut us from our roots, and invites you to reconnect with your ancestral Indigenous lineage and relationship with land that predates our socialization into systems of oppression. We will be joined by wisdom carriers from different indigenous backgrounds. Our online course will include interactive learning, embodied cognition and self-reflection.
Being rooted and related to land and those who inhabit it has been an existential prerequisite and foundation of existence for all people. We all descend from people who once knew how to live harmoniously with Earth and the value of interdependence and reciprocity. Indigenous culture is inseparable from land, which is why Indigenous stewardship and ecological care is responsible for protecting around 80% of the world’s biodiversity, even after centuries of ruthless genocidal erasure.
Unless we root in our authentic unique ancestral ways of living, we won’t be able to appreciate the roots of other people. We might even end up uprooting or appropriating others as we hunger for aliveness and authentic spirituality. Re-indigenizing ourselves requires a deep commitment and a clear intention. Willingness to embrace where we come from, so we can truly inhabit the present moment in full connection with the continuum of time and land. Re-rooting is like a new contract with your lineage, letting them know you are ready to become a walking prayer for life.
This introduction video gives you an overview of the course:
Course dates
January 29th – February 7th
Research area
Decolonizing
Location
Online
Language
English
Cost
As an experiment with radical trust towards post-capitalist economics, we offer this course on donation. Please be honest and as generous as you can with your decision to contribute to this course.
Who is the course for?
The course is open for people from all cultural backgrounds, yet we will focus on reawakening western tribes and wisdom. If you come from a tribal/Indigenous culture, feel welcome as well and gift us your ways.
- Anyone who wants to rekindle their connection with land, any land.
- Anyone ready to face the bright and the dark sides of history in order to build the future.
- Anyone willing to include different ways of knowing and being besides the intellect.
- Anyone willing to think systemically
- Anyone willing to acknowledge your power and privileges
- Anyone interested in how activism can root itself in prayer
What you’ll learn?
- The current state of some Indigenous people, their stories, and struggles
- Why colonialism severs people’s connection to the land and how we can begin to reverse it
- How systems of oppression continue to alienate us from our roots
- How our activism becomes more whole and sustainable when we are rooted
- To explore: What is ours/mine to do, say in these times? What are different offers we can make, depending on our roots?
- Practical tools to connect with your roots and to develop a sense of belonging
- How to expand your imagination for possible post-colonialist futures
Course content
A’ida will be gifting us some of the practices she collected through years of research and restoring connection with her own Indigenous identity, to help white and other non-Indigenous people to gain knowledge and embody an experience of being rooted.
What´s the importance of collective myths? Which ones do we believe in and how does this inform our belief systems and our worldviews? Ancestors and lineage are more than just biological connections. Since life is an interconnected web, is it possible to look into the past and choose a lineage thread to identify with.
The course will be based on 6 live webinars. In the first 3 sessions, Aida will be sharing the story of her Bedouin tribe and the ways they kept their ancient wisdom, despite long decades of extreme political oppression and colonial erasure.
- January 29, Friday, 15:00–18:00 UTC/WET, Portugal time “My roots inform my activism” – They carry the memory of my ancestors, shaping my sense of justice and guiding me to act with integrity and courage in the face of oppression
- January 30, Saturday, 15:00–18:00 UTC/WET, Portugal time “Our roots are a door to possibilities” – They connect us to ancient wisdom and open pathways for re-imagining how we live, relate, and create futures beyond systems of domination
- January 31, Sunday, 15:00–18:00 UTC/WET, Portugal time “Collective rooting, movement towards action” – It becomes the ground from which solidarity grows, transforming shared memory into the courage and clarity needed to take steps toward real change
In the other 3 sessions, Aida will be hosting Indigenous guest teachers to share and exchange wisdom, knowledge and ways of being.
- February 5, Friday, 15:00–18:00 UTC/WET, Portugal time with Lone Beate Ebeltoft
- February 6, Saturday, 15:00–18:00 UTC/WET, Portugal time with Ashira Ali Darwish
- February 7, Sunday, 15:00–18:00 UTC/WET, Portugal time with Sara Aljneibi
After course support
- Free access to resources for further study
- Study platform will continue to be open indefinitely and allow you to exchange with fellow students
- An one hour call one month after the course ends to reflect and harvest