Rematriation

I was at a dinner last night and someone spoke of Rematriation. I was curious as I’d not heard the term before. Below pasted is an excerpt from engender.org.za. What I loved about the conversation last night was not the tags and names and associations, but the very simple and beautiful act of creating relationship with the earth and all of nature…in a harmonious existence. It seems we are moving farther away from that—and I invite you to move closer…however you choose to do.

Be inspired.

Lawless Capture@lawlesscapture

“The term Rematriation seems to have its origins in Psychology and Creativity (especially in the UK). The more recent adoption of Rematriation by Indigenous Americans and Africans is used entirely differently as a Rematriation of ancestral remains, spirituality, culture, knowledge and natural and other resources, instead of the more Patriarchally associated Repatriation.

In simpler terms, merely meaning back to Mother Earth, a return to our origins, a return to life and co-creation…

…rather than Patriarchal destruction and colonisation, a reclamation of germination instead of semination. As a restorative imperative, it is most relevant to feminists in general, since we, like Native peoples, need to reclaim our Feminist ancestry, our feminist spirituality, our feminist culture/s, knowledge and control over natural and other resources. We need to chart paths, strategic interventions, dreams and realities that are not mere alternatives to HeteroPatriarchalCapitalisms, but entirely reconfigure our cosmos, Rematriate our societies.

Rematriation is not utopian, since the number of gender egalitarian and/or matriarchal societies that still exist today, despite centuries of patriarchal encroachments and colonisation, remains powerful testimony of the values of ancient sacred mother-centred and women-centred spiritual communities, across all continents, from the Akan of Ghana and KhoeSan of Southern Africa, to the Minangkabau of Indonesia, the Mosuo and Lahu of China and the Khasi of India; to the Iroquois of North America and the Kuna of Panama, to the Saami of Scandinavia.”