Critical Cartography

Resources from the Library of Congress on Native American maps.

Native Land Digital is a Canadian not-for-profit organization, incorporated in December 2018. Native Land Digital is Indigenous-led, with an Indigenous Executive Director and majority Indigenous Board of Directors who oversee and direct the organization. Numerous non-Indigenous people also contribute as members of our Advisory Council.

A map of Los Angeles does not tell the story of its people. This StoryMap includes layered, sedimented cultural geographies of indigenous Los Angeles that includes the Tongva and Tataviam who struggle for recognition of their sacred spaces, American Indians who were removed from their lands and displaced through governmental policies of settler colonialism, and indigenous diasporas from Latin America and Oceania driven by displacements as a result of militarism, neoliberal economic policies, and overlapping colonial histories.

Pioneer Square and the Making of Queer Seattle chronicles the development of Seattle’s queer community from the 1890s to the present in Pioneer Square. While 1969 is often cited as the birth of the gay rights movement with the Stonewall riots in New York City, historians, indigenous scholars, and groups like The Northwest Lesbian and Gay History Museum Project (NWLGHMP) have found a vibrant and often visible queer world in many cities long before the term “Gay Liberation” was coined. This tour looks primarily before 1969 to show another example of an early vibrant queer community. The current tour comes from a walking tour, originally developed with the NWLGHMP in the 1990s by Angie McCarrel, a local architect, who wanted to not only preserve a history but also the buildings. Unfortunately, due many circumstances including earthquake damage from 1949 and increased gentrification, most of the original buildings no longer exist in their original form. This tour also acknowledges that Pioneer Square is on original Suquamish and Duwamish lands.

The Movement Advancement Project (MAP) tracks over 50 different LGBTQ-related laws and policies. This map shows the overall policy tallies (as distinct from sexual orientation or gender identity tallies) for each state, the District of Columbia, and the five populated U.S. territories. A state’s policy tally scores the laws and policies within each state that shape LGBTQ people's lives, experiences, and equality. The major categories of laws covered by the policy tally include: Relationship & Parental Recognition, Nondiscrimination, Religious Exemptions, LGBTQ Youth, Health Care, Criminal Justice, and Identity Documents.