“WE THANK THEREFORE WE ARE ... BECOMING.”
INTRO
Contextualizing Original Wisdom for Troubled Times
“This is the hardest time to live, but it is also the greatest honor to be alive now, and to be allowed to see this time. There is no other time like now. We should be thankful, for creation did not make weak spirits to live during this time. The old ones say ‘this is the time when the strongest spirits will live through and those who are empty shells, those who have lost the connection will not survive.’ We have become masters of survival - we will survive - it is our prophecy to do so.”
Founder of Akantu Institute Tiokasin Ghosthorse
Tiokasin is an author, teacher, activist and accomplished musician. Is a member of the Cheyenne River Lakota Nation of South Dakota and has a long history with Indigenous activism and advocacy.
‘Akantu’ is a Lakota word…
Akantu is a Lakota word meaning “Earth being, human” or in a deeper understanding, in Old Lakota, ‘a’ as a prefix is many beings walking, existing, living upon the Earth; ‘kan’ is energy; and ‘tu’ is the future and the past meeting in the present (time and space simultaneously).
The Akantu Institute focuses on re-contextualizing Original Wisdom for the current crisis moment of the Anthropocene.
The Institute primarily work in two ways:
Preserving and sharing knowledge from various wisdom traditions in accessible, relevant formats.
Hosting physical gatherings and ceremonies to deepen the experience of knowledge.
THERE WILL NOT BE PEACE ON EARTH
UNTIL THERE IS PEACE WITH EARTH
Tiokasin Ghosthorse
Artwork by: Jadina Lilien
The Lakota language is primarily a language operating in verbs - in feeling action or actuating feeling - not in descriptive nouns of subjugation and objectification.
Wicasa roughly translates into “a gift from the stars”. When we put this word with Akantu, Akantu Wicasa is an experience of integration with all Nations of Life, not just the human. The aim of the Institute is to transmit knowledge that cannot be taught but can only be experienced. Hence, we focus on sharing knowledge but also creating embodied experiences through gatherings and ceremonies.
The experience is an act of feeling the presence of another being in acknowledged coexistence. Once you have become a "relative" you become a wise one, an ancestor and descendant, simultaneously.
Being quiet, gentle, peaceful, still and listening may begin to open the experience of "being human" in the Lakota Paradigm …
GATHERINGS
EVENTS
Akantu Institute hosts classes, discussions and physical gatherings.
Click here to read the events schedule.
CEREMONIES
There are four conscious elements of living beings that make up the consciousness of both ceremonies and the constituent of the human being: Earth, Wind, Fire and Water.
KNOWLEDGE OF FOREVER
Original Nations are determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral knowledge and cultures; and to redress the returning of lands, territories, and resources of their Nations. Their continued existence as peoples is closely connected to their free will to influence their own fate and to live in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal systems. Indigenous peoples have prior rights to their territories, lands and resources, but often these have been taken from them and/or are threatened. They have distinct cultures and economies compared to those of the dominant society. Indigenous peoples face serious difficulties such as the constant threat of territorial invasion and murder, the plundering of their resources, cultural and legal discrimination, as well as a lack of recognition of their own institutions.
Akantu Institute urges you to stay informed and involved in protecting the rights of Indigenous people and their cultures. Civilizations need rules to exist and the rationalization of them to perpetuate their crimes. Cultures, worthy of the title of culture, often include mutual respect to live within relationship to all Life.
First Voices Radio
First Voices Radio is the longest running Indigenous radio program in the world. We urge you to stay informed and involved in protecting the rights of Indigenous people and their cultures. Civilizations need rules to exist and the rationalization of them. Cultures often include mutual respect to live within relationship to all life.
Articles & Podcasts
Here is a selection of recent articles and podcasts featuring Tiokasin and the work of Akantu Institute:
Articles:
Kinship Belonging in a World of Relations
Indigenous Languages as Cures of the Earth
Podcasts:
