Corrina Gould

Corrina Gould, of the Confederated Villages of Lisjan/Ohlone,[1] a Chochenyo and a Karkin Ohlone woman,[2] is a long-time activist who works to protect, preserve, and reclaim ancestral lands of the Ohlone peoples.[3][2] The Ohlone people live in the area now occupied by the greater San Francisco Bay Area, and Gould's tribe, specifically, is located in the East Bay, in regions now occupied by Oakland, Berkeley, and beyond.[4][5]

Early life

Gould was born and grew up in the location of the Ohlone village of Huichin,[6] on land now occupied by the city of Oakland, CA.

Career

Gould currently works full time at the American Indian Child Resource Center, running an after school program that provides services for Native students in Oakland.[2] She has a prolific history co-founding and working with a number of activist organizations.

She is the Spokesperson for the Confederated Villages of Lisjan/Ohlone, and a co-founder of the Sogorea Te Land Trust as well as Indian People Organizing for Change.[2]

Gould was the producer of several documentaries about Ohlone peoples and other native peoples. Her films include Buried Voices (2012), Injunuity (2013), and Beyond Recognition (2014).[7]

In addition, Gould is a member of the California Indigenous Environmental Association Board, as well as the Board of Directors for the Oakland Street Academy Foundation.[8]

Major Campaigns

As the lead organizer for the group Indian People Organizing for Change (IPOC), Gould has worked for over two decades to preserve and protect Ohlone Shellmounds, the ancient burial sites of her ancestors.[9] She is a cofounder of IPOC, which sponsored the Shellmound Peace Walk 2005–2009 and currently works to protect the West Berkeley Shellmound.[10][11] She has also led the campaign to collect a Shuumi Land Tax in order to return land to Indigenous people through the Sogorea Te Land Trust.[12]

Gould is currently focused on the West Berkeley Shellmound, at the site of the earliest known habitation in the Bay Area.[13] Carbon dating puts the earliest additions to the shellmound at about 3,700 B.C.E, with continuous additions from a village at the site until 800 C.E. At that point, the village relocated nearby, but the mound maintained ongoing ceremonial purposes, including as a burial site. While the portions of the mound that were aboveground, reportedly 300 feet long and thirty feet high, were removed by white inhabitants between the years of 1853 and 1910 and used to build roads and for other commercial purposes, the subterranean portions of the mound remain.[13] They are currently covered by a parking lot. A developer with plans to build high density housing on that spot has been stopped by the City of Berkeley, motivated by Gould's activism.[14] In 2000 the Berkeley City Council named the spot an historic landmark,[15] and in September, 2020, the National Trust for Historic Preservation declared the site as one of the 11 “most endangered historic places” in the United States.[16] Although the developer tried to get a streamlined approval process which would not have included as much public comment, the City did not pass that request and a judge further backed the City in a subsequent lawsuit.[14] Gould and the IPOC have continued to advocate throughout for the preservation of the remaining portions of their sacred site.[17]

In April 2011, Gould, Johnella LaRose, Wounded Knee De Ocampo, and other held a sit-in at Sogorea Te, a sacred site in the current city of Vallejo, CA, that lasted 109 days.[18] The occupation led to a cultural easement between the City of Vallejo, the Greater Vallejo Recreation District, and two federally recognized tribes.[19]

References
  1. SURJ Bay Area (2017-09-05). "Living On Ohlone Land — What We Learned From Indigenous Women Leaders". Medium. Retrieved 2020-12-13.
  2. "Corrina Gould". Womens Earth Alliance. Retrieved 2020-12-13.
  3. "Corrina Gould Defends Her Ancestors". Sacred Land. Retrieved 2020-12-13.
  4. "Impact of Spanish Colonization (U.S. National Park Service)". www.nps.gov. Retrieved 2020-12-13.
  5. "Lisjan (Ohlone) History & Territory". The Sogorea Te Land Trust. Retrieved 2020-12-13.
  6. "Learning From Ohlone History Today | Oakland Museum of California". museumca.org. Retrieved 2020-12-13.
  7. "Corrina Gould". IMDb. Retrieved 2020-12-13.
  8. Next Economy Now Podcast (2018-06-13). "Corrina Gould: Sacred Sites Work and Our Collective Responsibility as Weavers of Healing". Medium. Retrieved 2020-12-13.
  9. "Indian People Organzing for Change (IPOC) and the Sogorea Te Occupation". Found SF. August 2014.
  10. "Shellmounds". Indian People Organizing for Change.
  11. Luckey, Micki; Pluss, AJ (September 3, 2017). "Living On Ohlone Land — What We Learned From Indigenous Women Leaders". Showing Up for Racial Justice. Medium.
  12. "Shuumi Land Tax". Sogorea Te' Land Trust.
  13. "Berkeley Landmarks :: The Shellmound". berkeleyheritage.com. Retrieved 2020-12-14.
  14. "Judge rules for Berkeley in developer's lawsuit over Spenger's parking lot". Berkeleyside. 2019-10-23. Retrieved 2020-12-14.
  15. WOLLENBERG, CHARLES (2008). Berkeley: A City in History (1 ed.). University of California Press. doi:10.1525/j.ctt1ppx83. ISBN 978-0-520-25307-0.
  16. Staff, Taylor Rudman | (2020-09-25). "West Berkeley Shellmound and Village Site named 1 of 11 most endangered historic sites in US". The Daily Californian. Retrieved 2020-12-13.
  17. McLeod, Toby. "In Recognition of Indigenous Peoples' Day: Lisjan Ohlone Leader Corrina Gould to Brief Berkeley City Council on the History of the West Berkeley Shellmound and Village Site on Tuesday, October 13 ." Press Release. October 13, 2020.
  18. "Corrina Gould". Women's Earth Alliance.
  19. "These Indigenous Women Are Reclaiming Stolen Land in the Bay Area". Yes! Magazine. Retrieved 2020-12-14.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.