INFRASTRUCTURES OF CARE IN NDN SPACES: MUTUAL AID AS A FORM OF RADICAL RELATIONALITY

Abstract

The Internet and social media platforms afford Native Americans in the United States the ability to connect, organize, and mobilize for social justice beyond geographical boundaries and across the Native diaspora. Decolonizing research that takes an Indigenous research approach unsettles the dominant theories of social media use and helps center our focus on the possibilities that Indigenous peoples already imagine for themselves whether it be to strengthen their communities and culture, to work towards resistance and decolonization, or to move them towards resurgence and beyond. This research examines how the Internet and social media platforms become sites of decolonizing work through the facilitation of radical relationality, or more specifically, mutual aid. We are two Diné scholars, and approach this research with the Diné emphasis on K’é and Sa'ah Naagháí Bik'eh Hózhóón.