Unsettling Wright-Locke Farm and Re-Storying the Land: Centering Indigenous Histories in Environmental Education
Marston, Rachel C.
2021
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Spanning the fields of history, anthropology, and environmental studies, this project contends with the significance of colonial sites–the material representations of colonial relationships and encounters–in the construction of contemporary public historical consciousness. Taking local historical site Wright-Locke Farm as a case study, I work to unsettle dominant tellings of the farm’s history, ... read morede-centering stories of English colonial hegemony and Native disappearance. Instead, I work to uncover Wright-Locke's position within a greater web of Indigenous economic and social relationships on the land that now hosts Winchester, Massachusetts. Uncovering these hidden relationships involves reading between the lines of the colonial archives–early land records, probate records, and local history books–and putting them in conversation with Indigenous environmental historians, anthropologists, and anti-colonial theorists. The goal of this thesis is twofold: first, I aim to present an anti-colonial history of this small corner of Massachusetts, which includes the land that now hosts Tufts Medford-Somerville campus. Secondly, I aim to provide a framework within which colonial sites can directly confront their settler histories and foster conversations that unsettle colonial narratives. Ultimately, I argue that, when unsettled, "sites of coloniality" like Wright-Locke have a crucial part to play in anti-colonial and antiracist education. I urge sites like Wright-Locke to move beyond merely acknowledging their foundation on stolen land; they must forge reciprocal relationships with Indigenous and Indigenous-adjacent groups and move towards radical models of land education.
Advisors: Ninian Stein and Cathy Stantonread less - ID:
- 6682xk058
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