Ways of Knowing
A Navajo Nuclear History
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We were never meant to utilize
the earth's sacred elements
to destroy one another.
– Sunny Dooley
Nuclear history is typically told as something that happens to us. For example, the history of uranium mining in the American Southwest is often framed around the U.S. government’s Cold War efforts, and frames the landscape and its people as bystanders or victims.
But what if we understood it differently?
![contaminated-water](https://www.waysofknowing.us/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/contaminated-water-1.jpg)
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Ways of Knowing is a project that centers Navajo perspectives, experience, and expertise to confront nuclear legacies. It is an invitation to respond to trauma through healing and collective imagination. It recognizes that the land and life of Diné Bikéyah holds a history much deeper than the atom bomb, and envisions a future that transcends the threats of war.
Photos by Carmille Garcia