UW-Platteville honored Indigenous Peoples’ Day with a three-day series of events, including an interactive map display about native lands, a guest presentation on the survivance of indigenous culture and its ties to the land and the sixth annual Indigenous Peoples’ Day guest lecture, “Hocąk: Language is Our Culture,” presented by Dr. Andrew Thundercloud.

These events were collaboratively sponsored by Campus Climate; Diversity, Equity and Inclusion; the Department of History; and the Department of Environmental Sciences and Society.

Indigenous Peoples’ Day was recognized as and declared a national holiday by President Biden on Oct. 8, 2021. IPD is to be observed on the second Monday of October annually.

UW-Platteville began its series of events on Monday, Oct. 11 with the “Native Lands and Indigenous Sovereignty: Interactive Map Display” in the Markee Pioneer Student Center.

Dr. Eugene Tesdahl and others from the sponsoring organizations guided viewers through a visual retelling of the history of native land boundaries and sizes, spanning from hundreds of years ago until now.

Viewers were able to place small tacks onto their hometowns on a map of the Great Lakes region with native land boundaries as the emphasized borders, rather than U.S. state lines.