Preserving and Reviving Yesá Culture through Food, Language, and Sacred Places
March 12, 2-3 pm ET
The presentation will discuss how a movement of cultural revitalization began with ancestral seeds and evolved to bring about a resurgence of traditional food practices and lifeways that have fostered Yesá community identity and belonging through language and cultural learning. Yesá refers to “the people” of Eastern Siouan communities descended from the Monacan Alliance, whose ancestral territories spanned throughout the Appalachian piedmont, ridge and valley, and mountains from the falls lines in Richmond, Virginia, west into West Virginia and south into North Carolina. The talk will provide both a historical perspective of Yesá food practices and how they shaped the landscapes of this region as well as examine the current experiences of Yesá communities that are fighting to reclaim and protect sacred places, seeds, and the traditions that connect them to their ancestral homelands for future generations.
Presenters
- Victoria Persinger Ferguson, Program Director for Historic Solitude/Fraction at Virginia Tech, Monacan Indian Nation
- Desiree Shelley Flores, Center Graduate Student Fellow and Master's Student, Department of Agricultural, Leadership and Community Education at VT, Monacan Indian Nation
- Dr. Crystal Cavalier-Keck, Co-Founder of Seven Directions of Service, Occaneechi Band of Saponi Nation