We live in a modern era of land speculation and resource profiteering. Separated by two continents and even more water, two indigenous groups resist the ceaseless expansion of extractive industry within their communities. The arrival of a Chinese mining company and the construction of a sprawling nickel mining and processing facility in Eastern Papua New Guinea creates unrest and endless issues for the natives living there.
Forced to live on the taboo lands of their sacred mountain, the local people face constant disrespect from their government and the Chinese mining company as their graveyards and sacred sites are desecrated without any punishment or admission of fault.
In Canada, first nations people gather to protest the destruction and pollution of their hunting and fishing grounds near Canada’s tar sands. Though some will say the drilling and transport of black gold will bring jobs to the area, science shows that cancer and other health risks await those who eat or drink the contaminated water, fish, and wildlife that accompany oil extraction.
Anyone well-versed in ecological scholarship will know that our society’s constant consumption often means that someone elsewhere pays a price for our relative prosperity. Standing on Sacred Ground: Profit and Loss allows a variety of people involved to speak their minds about the issues of pollution, environmental racism, and the extractive industry’s seemingly endless ability to destroy what is precious and irreplaceable for the sake of short-term profit.
The style of this documentary is dry and journalistic, but the footage and message displayed are valuable for anyone learning about environmental justice and indigenous activism. Standing on Sacred Ground is presented in two nearly 30-minute segments, making this documentary an outstanding choice for educators with short class periods. This documentary makes two excellent cases of why people are so fervent in their pursuit of environmental justice. Highly Recommended.
Where does this title belong on public library shelves?
Standing on Sacred Ground: Profit and Loss would make an outstanding addition to environmental and indigenous rights documentary collections.
What type of college instructors would use this film?
Professors of ecology, indigenous cultures, and public administration would all find incredible use in Standing on Sacred Ground: Profit and Loss. This educational documentary is a must-have for any classroom teaching environmental justice.
How does this film contribute to a discussion of environmental or climate justice, and/or to environmental literacy?
Standing on Sacred Ground does an outstanding job connecting disparate indigenous environmental activism across the globe. Those studying indigenous resistance will be most interested in this title.
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Teacher's Guide
Curator | David N.M. Mbora
Associate Professor of Biology and Environmental Science, Whittier College
Why I selected this film
I chose this film because it makes an important point about the high cost that native peoples have to pay to provide the industrial raw materials and fossil fuel energy that drive the economies of industrialized countries. The high costs, in the form of lost livelihoods and nasty health effects on the indigenous people, are often invisible to the residents of industrialized countries. In addition, the film highlights important grassroots efforts by the indigenous peoples to hold governments and industry accountable. Such environmental activism, I believe, is important because it empowers local peoples to pursue environmental justice.
Please see the teacher's guide for maps, background information and suggested subjects, questions and activities.
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