Author Archives: Stephen Carr Hampton

About Stephen Carr Hampton

Stephen Carr Hampton is an enrolled citizen of Cherokee Nation, an avid birder since age 7, and a former resource economist for the California Department of Fish & Game, where he worked as a tribal liaison and conducted natural resource damage assessments and oversaw environmental restoration projects after oil spills. He writes most often about Native history and contemporary issues, birds, and climate change.

The basics of sea level rise

Posted on September 8, 2017 by Stephen Carr Hampton

I was lucky to be out of town for a week during “the greatest statewide heat wave ever recorded in California.” When I arrived in Seattle, I was quickly informed that they had just set a record of 55 consecutive … Continue reading →

Posted in news | Tagged #climatechange, antarctic, climate change, CO2, greenland, ipcc, prediction, puget sound, sea level rise | 1 Comment

Totality Visions

Posted on August 22, 2017 by Stephen Carr Hampton

“It’s so beautiful.” My voice was uncontrollably shaking and tears were welling up in my eyes. Like Jodie Foster at the end of Contact. From atop a sagebrush bluff in eastern Oregon, we felt the day cool and the bright … Continue reading →

Posted in my own thoughts | Tagged #SolarEclipse2017, 1890, eclipse, ghost dance, nevada, Paiute, unity, visions, Wounded Knee, wovoka | 1 Comment

The rapid rise and fall of racist symbols

Posted on August 16, 2017 by Stephen Carr Hampton

The Southern Poverty Law Center prepared this remarkable diagram, illustrating when Confederate symbols, such as statues, flags, and monuments, were erected in public places– mostly around 1910 and then again in the 1960s during the Civil Rights movement. Their full … Continue reading →

Posted in news | Tagged #charlottesville, cnn, columbia, confederate, mascot, monuments, Pocahontas, robert e lee, southern poverty law center, statues | Leave a comment

Native mascots and logos: A good op-ed from Winters, California

Posted on July 30, 2017 by Stephen Carr Hampton

Though the author is not Native, this is really one of the better op-eds I’ve seen on this topic. Thank you Debra DeAngelo. It comes from the Davis Enterprise in northern California and is about the Winters High School Warriors … Continue reading →

Posted in reblogs | Tagged deangelo, indians, mascot, native american, warriors, winters | Leave a comment

Mapping Native America

Posted on July 9, 2017 by Stephen Carr Hampton

There are lots of maps of Native America floating around in books and on-line, most suggesting a sea of an indigenous nation-states that was fixed in time until the Europeans arrived. In reality, these “tribes” labeled on maps were most … Continue reading →

Posted in my own thoughts | Tagged aboriginal territory, carapella, map, mapping, maps, native american, Native American history, native lands, native-land.ca | Leave a comment

Standing Rock: Court victory may be short lived

Posted on July 1, 2017 by Stephen Carr Hampton

I’ve just finished reading the 91-page ruling from US District Court Judge Boasberg. Touted as a “major victory” for the Standing Rock and Cheyenne River Sioux Tribes, there’s still a lot to be worried about as legal proceedings continue. First, … Continue reading →

Posted in news, Standing Rock | Tagged #DAPL, #noDAPL, #standingrock, #standwithStandingRock, boasberg, EA, eis, environmental justice, judge, pipeline, risk, ruling, Sioux, spill, SRST, Standing Rock | 3 Comments

Photography of Native Americans, past and present

Posted on June 17, 2017 by Stephen Carr Hampton

Teju Cole, a Nigerian living in New York City, is one of my favorite writers and photographers. In his recent column in New York Times Magazine, he compares the portraits by Horace Poolaw, Kiowa, with those by Edward Curtis. Poolaw’s … Continue reading →

Posted in my own thoughts, news, Standing Rock | Tagged edward curtis, horace poolaw, josue rivas, Moses on the Mesa, native american, New York Times, photographs, Standing Rock | Leave a comment

Standing Rock: Victory in Court

Posted on June 14, 2017 by Stephen Carr Hampton

A federal judge made a mixed ruling today, though largely in favor of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe (SRST), that the permitting process for the Dakota Access Pipeline was flawed. Earthjustice, whose legal team represented SRST, has issued a press … Continue reading →

Posted in news, Standing Rock | Tagged #DAPL, #noDAPL, dakota, Dakota Access, EA, eis, judge, oil, permit, pipeline, ruling, Sioux, SRST, Standing Rock | Leave a comment

Standing Rock mercenaries’ secrets revealed

Posted on June 12, 2017 by Stephen Carr Hampton

In recent weeks, whistleblowers have revealed documents and stories regarding renegade behavior by private security firms hired by Energy Transfer Partners (ETP) to protect the Dakota Access Pipeline from protesters. But the mercenaries went a lot further than that, creating … Continue reading →

Posted in Standing Rock | Tagged #noDAPL, #standingrock, #standwithStandingRock, backwater bridge, dakota, Dakota Access, energy transfer partners, mercenaries, North Dakota, private security firm, Standing Rock, Tigerswan | Leave a comment

Birding in Gambell: Native and White cultures come together at the edge of the world

Posted on June 7, 2017 by Stephen Carr Hampton

In the middle of the Bering Sea, where the only other visible land are the gleaming snow-clad peaks of the Russian Far East, two cultures meet in a strange symbiotic juxtaposition. Gambell is a Siberian Yupik village, named for the … Continue reading →

Posted in my own thoughts | Tagged alaska, birding, bowhead, chiffchaff, climate change, Gambell, ivory, lodge, nome, sea ice, Sivuqaq, St. Lawrence, umiaq, walrus, Yupik | Leave a comment