Newe Sogobia is Not for Sale

Subtitled: The Struggle for Western Shoshone Land Land activists Mary and Carrie Dann confront Federal Bureau of Land Management officers determined to impound the women's livestock until they pay grazing fees on land the Shoshone have never sold or otherwise legally transferred to the U.S. government. Part of an ongoing conflict over who will control ancestral lands in Nevada, this videotape depicts a standoff between the two groups, as activists speak about their ties to the land and their determination to keep it at any cost. At the heart of the confrontation is a disagreement about what the land means. Using the argument (dating to the first land seizures) that they know how to best develop and use the land, the Nevada BLM claims to be acting in the best environmental interests. This is the same bureau that encourages nuclear waste disposal, open-pit gold mining with cyanide leech ponds, and military weapons testing on the same land. Respect and care for the earth is a central Western Shoshone spiritual practice and one of the motives in their struggle for sovereignity.