“Staying is complicated, Not staying, however, is unthinkable”: A critical review of Indigenous presence in “natural” parks as a critique of colonial place making for conservation and leisure

Abstract

This response critically draws on an important theme from Dr. Hi'ilei Julia Hobart's 2024 Political Geography plenary address, “Indigenous Place-making Amidst Settler Colonial Leisure.” Her powerful complication of the idea of ‘staying’ inside protected spaces as always both on-going compromise and a form of resistance. When Indigenous groups fight to stay inside protected spaces designed for conservation and leisure tourism, they are often forced to fit colonial capitalist models of what it means to be Indigenous. Yet in so doing, groups may simultaneously challenge the models themselves—of Indigeneity, but also of conservation/leisure tourism. I draw on Hobart's framing to discuss the case of Maasai fighting to stay inside the Ngorongoro Conservation Area in Tanzania. I argue that Hobart's insights deepen political-geographical understandings of Indigenous resistance to capitalist/colonial ideals of conservation and leisure, by complicating resistance through ‘staying’ inside protected spaces.