Honoring & Empowering
Anishinaabe Culture
and Tradition
We create programs to teach our language, pass on our culture, and
embody our sacred relationship to niibi (water) and manoomin (wild rice)
The Niibi Center is a repository
of Anishinaabe culture and knowledge to
protect our prophecy, sovereignty, and cultural survival
Maintain
Our Identity and Nation
We seek to honor Anishinaabe cultural teachings, build a strong sense of indigenous identity, heal historical trauma, and exercise inherent sovereignty.
Protect
Niibi and Manoomin
We work together among clans, agencies, tribal communities, generations, and partnerships to protect water –within and beyond tribal nations are guided and informed by Anishinaabe values, teachings, and leadership.
Embody
Respectful Relationships With All That Is
We strive to embody the Anishinaabe tradition of mino bimaadiziwin (to live in a good way), by protecting and sharing traditional knowledge and cultural identity in support of water and wild rice.
In Anishinaabe tradition there is prophecy that foretold a place where “food grows on the water”
When our people arrived in the woodlands of Gitchigami (Lake Superior) we found manoomin (wild rice) growing in the lakes and rivers and we knew we had found our home.
Our people have a sacred connection and responsibility to niibi (water) and manoomin that continues to this day.
The Protectors of the Water
Women play a key role in
Anishinaabe tradition
Traditionally Anishinaabe women are the “protectors” of the water. The Niibi Center is specifically devoted to empowering women in fulfilling this role.
Our identity is fully interwoven with the land and water of our home, the traditions and culture of our people, our families, and the Seven Fires prophecies that tell our history and light a path for our people today.
Water protection is not simply an “environmental cause” to Anishinaabe people, it is core to our identity as a people, and a sacred responsibility that we have inherited from our ancestors.
Learn about Anishinaabe land:
Water Protection Today
In Minnesota, Wisconsin, & Canada
Our people have been leading the efforts to protect the water throughout Minnesota and Wisconsin from contamination and danger as a result of oil and gas pipelines.
Deep Healing Of historic trauma
Our people want to feel connected to our identity and roots, but we have long been prevented from being fully Anishinaabe.
Our language, traditions, and identity has been taken from us through historic (and continuing) assimilation, dislocation, and disruption. There is much healing that must take place in our community.
The Niibi Center provides resources and programs to further the revitalization of cultural traditions and bring healing to deep, inter-generational trauma.
