Virtual Badger Talk: “Hidden in Plain Sight: Native American Cultural Landscape”

Join American Indian Curriulum Services Coordinator Omar Poler to discuss the Native American cultural landscape present all around us. In using place-based experiential learning, we can explore the revolving relationship between Indians and non-Indians in the development of campus buildings and landmarks over time. We can examine and interrogate Indigenous landmarks created between 700 and 2500 years ago. In interpreting the significance of the landmarks, we can provide an overview of American Indian history leading us to a greater awareness of modern Indigenous nations and peoples.

Omar Poler is an enrolled member of the Sokaogon Chippewa Community and serves as the Interim American Indian Curriculum Services Coordinator at the School of Education. In that position, he leads UW-Madison First Nation Cultural Landscape Tours and is involved with campus and community signage projects to support learning about First Nations cultures, languages, histories, and sovereignty. He has also served as an Outreach Specialist at the UW-Madison Information School, where has worked closely with tribal librarians, archivists, and museum curators in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Minnesota.