Sharidynn Denetchiley
Template:TOCnestleft Sharidynn Denetchiley is a New Mexico activist.
Effort to abolish the seal of the University of New Mexico
On May 1, "Over 100 people including students, faculty, administration, and community members joined The Red Nation and the KIVA Club for a speak-out in front of the president’s office on University of New Mexico’s campus to abolish the school’s racist seal featuring the infamous colonizers, a conquistador and a frontiersman."
According to a report at The Red Nation website, "Black, Chicano, LGBTQ, Indigenous, Palestinian, Asian, and other working-class people came together and united against a common enemy, colonialism and capitalism."[1]
According to Rebecca Hampton of Liberation News over 100 people including students, faculty, administration, and community members joined The Red Nation and the KIVA Club for a speak-out in front of the president’s office on University of New Mexico’s campus to abolish the school’s racist seal featuring the infamous colonizers, a conquistador and a frontiersman. UNM is located on traditional Indigenous Pueblo land, where occupation and genocide against Native people is ongoing.
The Red Nation organizer David Maile said, “Respect existence or expect resistance!” The seal mocks the existence of Native people, but today activists and community members celebrated 500 years of resistance and carried the struggle forward for liberation and self-determination for Native people.
UNM directly profits from its occupation of indigenous land in multiple ways, Sharidynn Denetchiley, student and organizer with the International Leonard Peltier Defense Committee, explained. “UNM gets a lot out of Tribal Scholarships from in-state and out of state, and [UNM] is gaining more and more financially, so these demands need to be met.”