Upcoming University Panel on the Stand at Standing Rock

Indigenous Water Protectors and the Dakota Access Pipeline Controversy: Implications for Protecting Global Water Security, People, and Environmental Resources

Panel Discussion

30 November, 7-9pm

Florida International University MMC (main campus) Building PG5 Room 153

Florida International University asked me to help organize a panel on the topic of the Stand at Standing Rock - Indigenous People's rights in America and US Government preference for the oil industry in claiming energy security priority over water security, food security, and human security. In a remarkably quick turnaround - three FIU groups came together to make this happen:

• The Global Indigenous Forum
• The GLobal Water Security Forum
• Studies of Spirituality

For this panel Faith Spotted Eagle, an Elder from the Yankton Sioux Tribe and Treaty Council member, as well as member of the Brave Heart Society, an indigenous society for grandmothers to keep Dakota Tradition, will be our Keynote Speaker. She will be joined by Bob Billie, spiritual leader of the local Miccosukee Tribe, Sam Tommie environmental activist and filmmaker from the Seminole Tribe, Dennis Wiedman medical and environmental anthropologist who works with Indigenous Peoples in Florida and Oklahoma as well as Director of FIU's Global Indigenous Forum, Manuel Gomez lawyer working on the Chevron oil case in Ecuador with Indigenous People, and I will moderate and contribute as a water security geographer and river scientist working with Indigenous People on conflicts of modernity in the Nile, Mekong, and now the Missouri basins.

I hope you can join us for this discussion about one of the most pressing issues in America at this moment in time.