Settler colonialism is thirsty: Allison Madia, Transforming the Tohono: Water Management, O’odham Labor, and Settlerhood, PhD dissertation, UCLA, 2024 | settler colonial studies blog

Settler colonialism is thirsty: Allison Madia, Transforming the Tohono: Water Management, O’odham Labor, and Settlerhood, PhD dissertation, UCLA, 2024

29Jun24

Abstract: This dissertation investigates the reproduction of American settler colonialism in the Tohono (desert, Tohono O’odham territory) and waterways’ physical and ideological reconstruction via the appropriation of O’odham labor and indigeneity since the early twentieth century. Social scientists have emphasized the role of infrastructure, land, labor, race, and gendered and sexualized power in the physical and ideological reproduction of settler colonialism in the United States. Looking at the transformation of the Tohono following American colonialism, I ask, “How has indigeneity been appropriated to reconstruct waterways in the Tohono since Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal? How has American settler colonialism established collaborative arrangements with O’odham in the form of governance and labor? How have ideas and responses to water management impacted the everyday lives of O’odham?” I focus on historical and current experiences and perceptions of drought to trace the role of power in local and national discussions of water management. This research argues four main points: 1) both water management and the racialization of Tohono O’odham labor have been intricately tied to the expansion of settler colonialism, 2) commercial agriculture has worked to shape the racial and gendered experiences of Indigenous women, 3) American scientists and media sources in Southern Arizona have historically nationalized discussions about water to garner political and economic support for conservation projects, and 4) Collaborative arrangements between Tohono O’odham elites and Anglo American elites have produced structures of stratification expressed in fiscal inequality and historically recurring experiences of environmental and political violence.

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