McNeely
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the primary distinguishing feature of indigenous groups, relative to other minorities, is their
relationship to the land itself, i.e., their aboriginal title or original occupation of the associated
lands and territories. (The term "aborigine" comes from the Latin ab origine, meaning "from the
beginning.") This relationship to the land is part of the traditional depictions of indigenous
groups. All have ancient ties to the land, water, and wildlife of their ancestral domains, and all
have been endangered by onrushing forces of the outside world; their homelands have been
overrun by commercial resource extractors and invading populations (Alan Durning 1992:5).
It is particularly this issue of land and aboriginal title that is the basis for the common
"environmental identity" of indigenous groups. As a member of the Mapuche of Chile notes,
"amid the endless variety of indigenous belief, there is striking unity on the sacredness of
ecological systems" (in Durning 1992:28). Most think of themselves as custodians and
caretakers of their land and other resources; self-defined as caretakers of the land, they typically
claim a special relationship with their native soil. Note the image of custodians and caretakers --
not of owners (Alan Durning 1992). (This is in direct opposition to typical western images. If
you look up the word "land" in a thesaurus or dictionary, you find as synonyms words such as
"estate," "holding," "property," and "possession.") While common experiences of
marginalization and discrimination are also bases of shared identity formation, the image as
"guardians of the land" is an important part of the discursive frame in which indigenous peoples
have constructed their common internal identity, and it is also part of the discursive frame in
which their external environmental identity is constructed.
Convention