Shelly & Ginger Covert Interview
WOMXN | NATURE Stories of Rematriation
Shelly and Ginger Covert are both members of the Nevada City Rancheria Nisenan Tribe and they both sit on the Tribal Council. The Nisenan are the Indigenous people of the Bear and Yuba River watersheds, and what is now called Nevada City. Their ancestors tended these lands for thousands of years before settlers came to the Sierra Foothills during the Gold Rush. Shelly Covert is the spokesperson for the Nevada City Rancheria Nisenan Tribe. She is also the Executive Director for the California Heritage: Indigenous Research Project, or CHIRP, a 501c3 non-profit organization that works to preserve, protect, and perpetuate the Nisenan Culture.
"There is a long and rich history that graced this land long before the Gold Rush. Since the big changes of 1848, our families have fought to survive within our homelands. Today, we strive to be seen by our community and we want to share our story." ~ Shelly Covert
Learn More about the Nevada City Rancheria Nisenan Tribe and their non-profit CHIRP: nisenan.org
OUR INTERVIEW
Stories Of Rematriation Art
We Are The Land
(Watercolor on Paper)
This piece is about Shelly and Ginger's deep connection with the landscape of their ancestral homelands. Their reverence for this land is tangible. Their care and love for the flora and fauna of the Sierra Foothills is a part of their cultural traditions and something Settlers on these lands can learn from.
Quotes from our interview:
“From a Native American perspective, the land is here for all of us, everybody has rights, you choose your leaders in these small communities to simply best manage the landscape, best manage the spirits, so that you can have as many generations as possible. Especially the older women and grandmothers had a say, and one of the reasons they had so much political power was because they knew all the leaders when they were children. That is why our elders are so important, because no one knows us better.”
“You can’t dig, you can’t mine Mother Earth, this is our Mother. Settlers thought that this was an infantile or juvenile expression, but what Natives mean by this is our Mother, was this is our Life, literally. You are birthed and you return to it when you die. The only sustainable thing is the planet itself.”
"It’s a feeling and its hard to even get there with the expression of words, about how I feel about the land and the animals. There is a magic there, that I believe if people tuned into it, could lead us to what is right and wrong. There is something there that guides people and invites people. Make that connection with the land, and I think the land is perfectly capable of telling people what it needs and wants, it’s just that people aren’t listening."