Ask a current Detroiter what stands at the junction of the Detroit and Rouge Rivers in the Delray neighborhood, and they may tell you about Zug Island: blast furnaces, mounds of coal, and gated-off trestle bridges guarded by signs warning “No Trespassing” and “Cameras Prohibited.” There is no sign at the site, however, of what Delray residents in the 19th century would have seen on the opposite riverbank: the Great Mound of the River Rouge, an enormous mound where generation after generation of Indigenous tribes in the region buried their dead.

The destruction of the burial mounds in Detroit paralleled the displacement and genocide of Indigenous peoples in the United States. The more I read about the mounds in Detroit and across the Midwest, the more I encountered the nineteenth-century rhetoric of “civilization” used to rationalize the annexation and obliteration of Indigenous peoples and culture. As Ibram X. Kendi argues in Stamped from the Beginning (2016), throughout history racist ideas have been created as a way to justify economically motivated racist policies, leading “consumers of these racist ideas to believe there is something wrong with [the people they target]

The question of what reparations can look like for Indigenous peoples—who are continuing to battle for the rights to land deemed as theirs—is complicated. Even the term “reparations” is problematic: it implies an economic solution, which, as Indigenous studies scholar Daniel Wildcat points out, is a very American approach. Writing in the Washington Post, Wildcat explains that “For many Native Americans, our land… is a natural relative, not a natural resource. And our justice traditions require the restoration of our land relationship.” What would Zug Island look like if the land were returned to Indigenous care, with federal funding for its restoration guided by Indigenous stewardship practices?

Change is already on its way. The City of Detroit recently reached an agreement with the National Park Service on a proposal to revitalize Fort Wayne through a “rehabilitation in lieu of rent” model, in which public and private organizations can pay to restore historical buildings for the right to occupy them for a length of time commensurate to the investment. The Nottawaseppi Huron Band of Potawatomi may be one of these partners, reclaiming the remaining burial mound along with a museum on the grounds.

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