INDIGENOUS ELDER WILLIAM COMMANDA AND THE CIRCLE OF ALL NATIONS DISCOURSE

This paper uses a Foucauldian discourse analysis lens to examine the discourse, cybernetic mapping and spatial and temporal reach of William Commanda and his informal bridge building Circle of All Nations global eco peace community and queries its relevance to academic study of environmental and social justice relational issues during this age of the Anthropocene, and times of climate change, extreme weather, unprecedented extinction of species, systemic and overt racism, violence, global pandemic and social upheaval across the globe. It explores the nature and relevance of his discourse, inclusive of the Seven Fires Prophecy, which anticipated times of unprecedented global crisis embedded in the ancient mnemonic Wampum Belt of the 1400s. William Commanda was born in 1913, on the eve of the First World War; it is ironic that the Isaias hurricane, tornadoes and flooding were unleashed on August 3, 2020, nine years after his death, in a world on fire at multiple levels, and one hurtling on an evolutionary trajectory of unforeseeable change and challenge.