The Sogorea Te Land Trust

An urban Indigenous women-led land trust that facilitates the return of Indigenous land to Indigenous people

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Before You Are Here

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Celebrate Native Heritage Month with the release of the Before You Are Here map and event uplifting Ohlone voices and perspectives exploring the histories and representations of Bay Area Indigenous territories and their present manifestations.

The Before You Are Here map challenges traditional cartographic paradigms by weaving together multiple spaces and times to depict the Bay Area as an ambiguous, relational, and deeply contested site focusing on the where, rather than the when. 

Speakers will include Corrina Gould, Confederated Villages of Lisjan Nation, Gregg Castro, T’rowt’raahl Salinan / Rumsien-Ramaytush Ohlone, and Quirina Geary, Tamien Nation, along with UC Berkeley cartographer Clancy Wilmott. Hosted By Sogorea Te’ Land Trust.

Get your Tickets Here! …

Fall 2024 Newsletter

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As we continue our work of Rematriation, we invite our community and supporters to listen to our stories from the land and our growing programs and projects, through our seasonal newsletter.

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On Ohlone Land at Fairyland Hill!

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Children’s Fairyland and Sogorea Te’ Land Trust Transform the Iconic “Fairyland” sign to “Ohlone Land” at Fairyland Hill.

OAKLAND, CA, October 10, 2024 — Children’s Fairyland, the Sogorea Te’ Land Trust, and the Confederated Villages of Lisjan are excited to announce a historic partnership with the transformation of the iconic “Fairyland” sign on Fairyland Hill along Lake Merritt to “Ohlone Land” in honor of Indigenous Peoples’ Day.

The collaborative group will unveil the “Ohlone Land” sign on Thursday, October 10, 2024, at 12 p.m. PST at Fairyland Hill, and it will remain on display through the new year. This change recognizes the ancestral caretakers of the land—the Lisjan Nation—and reinforces the park’s commitment to amplifying Indigenous voices and stories within its programming.

The idea for the sign originated from a digital rendering shared by Sogorea Te’ Land Trust on social media last year, reimagining “Fairyland” as “Ohlone Land.” The image sparked discussions about visibility and set the stage for this meaningful collaboration.

“We are proud to deepen our relationship with the Sogorea Te’ Land Trust and the Lisjan Nation, and add a new meaning to a beloved Oakland symbol,” said Kymberly Miller, the executive director of Children’s Fairyland. …

Call for Proposals: Detours Decolonial Guide

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Detours: A Decolonial Guide to the Indigenous Bay Area is a co-edited volume in the Detours series of decolonial guidebooks at Duke University Press.

Photo is the Tule in the Sky Mural  by Cece Carpio with the Berkeley Skyline and Bay. 

Spanning the stolen, ancestral, traditional, and unceded territories of numerous Indigenous peoples, Northern California’s Bay Area is a place with deeply layered associations, entangled dispossessions, and possible futures. From Coast Miwok territories in the north to the Ramaytush Ohlone territory of Yelamu (San Francisco); from Lisjan Ohlone land in the East Bay to Amah Mutsun land in the south, Indigenous peoples have been rooted here sice time immemorial, surviving waves of colonialism and genocide from Spanish missions to the present U.S. occupation. As with other collections in the Detours series, this multidisciplinary collection will include several genres, including mapping/cartography, written and visual narratives of place, essays, visual art, tour itineraries, and other forms of media and cultural production. 

The Bay Area is a deeply layered place; simultaneosly a site of settler colonial, imperial, and racial/techno-capitalist dispossession and one rich with Indigenous presence and a long history of anti-colonial movements. It has long been home to large urban Indian communities, …

Indigenous Land Return Announcement by Sogorea Te’ Land Trust and Movement Generation!

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PRESS RELEASE

Berkeley, Calif. (June 21, 2023) — Today,  Movement Generation and Sogorea Te’ Land Trust announced that they have partnered to return 43 acres of land to Indigenous care, in the unceded Bay Miwok territory of the San Francisco East Bay Area. MG and Sogorea Te’ liberated the land title from the speculative real estate market, with Sogorea Te’ now holding the deed. The organizations have created long-term agreements together for care of the land.

Sogorea Te’ Land Trust is an urban Indigenous women-led nonprofit that facilitates the return of Indigenous land to Indigenous people. For more than 20 years, its founders have been organizing to protect Indigenous lands in the Bay Area, where Ohlone people have lived for thousands of years and now Indigenous peoples of many nations call home.

“Returning land to Indigenous care is healing for us and healing for the land,” says Corrina Gould, co-founder of Sogorea Te’ Land Trust and tribal chairperson of the Confederated Villages of Lisjan. “Working together with Movement Generation to create visions and commitments into the next generations allows us to reimagine relationships to this land and multiply the possibilities of our work.” 

The nonprofit collective …