Indigenous geopolitics

This chapter discusses indigenous peoples as agents of geopolitical change.

It reviews strands of work in geography that discuss indigenous peoples and

geopolitical issues of territory, identity and subject-formation. As I hope to

show here, indigenous people are more than merely agents of a parochial form

of geopolitics - this is no 'niche' form of 'minority studies' within the political

geographical tradition. Rather, manifold engagements with indigenous peoples

- in colonial encounters, in government policy, in the spaces of contemporary

everyday life- have deeply shaped the world we now know. Examinations of

indigenous peoples and geopolitics bring into sharp relief questions of land and

control, resources and livelihoods, agency and cultural identity- processes that as

Glassman argued, affect literally billions of people (2006: 609). In more subtle ways,

too, the manner in which indigenous people have been conceptualized historically

has shaped both geopolitical relations globally and the broader handling of human

cultural and geographical difference.