The Cultural Memory of Environmental Injustice
- Anne Basham
- Apr 7
- 2 min read
The Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) conflict has sparked national conversations about the dangers of fossil fuel infrastructure to public safety and the unjust treatment of Indigenous Peoples in the United States.
When thinking about how to integrate the Dakota pipeline conflict as a case study in your classroom it is important for students to understand the systems of power that are involved and to examine how these systems promote harm whether directly or indirectly. Are we to view the Dakota Access Pipeline as a conflict over water access or is it something more? For many Indigenous communities, water is not merely a resource but represents a cosmological and spiritual connection with one’s ancestors. This case study is not only about disruption to water access but also the potential to disrupt and threaten cultural identity and continuity.
How do Western systems of power (government, religious, or scientific) cause harm that can result in environmental injustice? From an anthropological perspective there is a term called cultural memory. Cultural memory is the shared pool of knowledge, traditions, narratives, and symbols that a society or group uses to construct its identity and define its relationship to the past. In cultures without written documentation, we can see the impact of harm and environmental injustice deeply rooted in historical and cultural memory and within space and place. Collective trauma can leave its scars in material culture via story, art, and ritual.
The Dakota Access Pipeline conflict is not an isolated event but rather is the result of a long history of broken treaties with the U.S. Army Corps. Taking a critical pedagogy approach students would conduct their own historical research to reveal the underlying systems of power that have perpetuated longstanding conflicts between Indigenous Peoples and the government. As of March 28, 2025, a federal judge dismissed the latest attempt by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe to shut down the pipeline, stating that the tribe had not sufficiently shown that the pipeline poses an immediate threat of irreparable harm.
“Whose evidence is present? Whose evidence is absent? Whose history has been forgotten? And whose memory should be told?” (Pezzullo, 2003, p. 232 as cited by Dames 2025). A chapter in the work Introducing Environmental Justice Advocacy by Mariam Dames proposes that marginalized communities who bear the greatest burden of environmental injustice should turn to sharing their stories to resist historical and cultural erasure by those who have the power to change the narrative.
Matthew P. Brigham, Doreen Philip, and Grace Smith. (2025). Introducing Environmental Justice Advocacy. Openly licensed via CC BY 4.0.