Wonder Woman of the Week: Winona LaDuke

The spotlight for this week is a major force of leadership among the environmental protection, Native American Civil Rights, and women's rights movements. Her work extends to the protections of the environment- on and off reservation land- as well as the advancement of women's and Indigenous rights.

Winona LaDuke was born to European Jewish and Ojibwe (also spelled Chippewa) heritage- the latter specifically of the White Earth Reservation. LaDuke received a high quality education by receiving a bachelor's degree in economics from Harvard and later master's in economic development from Antioch University.

After completing her education, Winona LaDuke saw a need to organize women from indigenous communities across the United States and Canada to specialize in working towards improving the standard of living for Native American women. This led to the establishment of the Indigenous Women's Network- and the idea spread throughout the Americas. LaDuke's organization quickly gained momentum as an advocacy group for the protection of natural resources and for slowing the effects of climate change. Following her organization's leadership, other indigenous women's groups across the Americas began focusing on environmental issues.

In 1989, LaDuke pushed further connecting the issues of environmental protection and human resources into a single issue when she founded the White Earth Land Recovery Project. The organization's goal was to buy back land that had been sold (either legally or illegally) during the 19th and 20th Centuries and giving it back to the Ojibwe Nation to use as education and outreach for Ojibwe youth to reconnect with lifestyles unseen since reservation times. One of the most important aspects of pre-reservation lifestyle for the Ojibwe was the wild rice harvest which (as one might expect) centered around harvesting wild rice as a food source. The organization successfully bought back land and helped reconnect young Ojibwe reconnect with pre-removal lifestyles.

LaDuke's most recent project has been with the Honor the Earth movement which focuses on protecting land within the confines of reservation borders as well as advocating for the projection of undeveloped land in the United States. The project- and through association, LaDuke- became heavily involved with the protests at Standing Rock Reservation when Indigenous Rights and environmental rights campaigners clashed with police and oil companies attempting to develop the land for oil extraction and transportation. LaDuke was at the forefront of the struggle as both a "front-lines" activist along the picket lines of protest as well as a leader, organizing resistance and speaking with news outlets about the struggle.

Winona LaDuke is adamant about challenging the view of pipeline protesters as individual activists promoting environmental issues and protecting natural resources (such as clean water sources and sacred land) and not as criminals and vandals with a shared goal of combating oil companies. Through LaDuke's leadership, women among Indigenous communities have become powerful environmental activists with the knowledge and shared goals of curbing the effects of climate change and challenging energy companies to switch to alternative and renewable energy sources.