Lehigh and Delaware Nation Announce Partnership

In recognition of the Indigenous people who originally inhabited what is today South Bethlehem, Lehigh University signed a historical Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) Oct. 13 with Delaware Nation, a sovereign, federally recognized nation of Lenape people.

The document signals an ongoing, reciprocal partnership with one of the Lenape tribal nations whose homelands Lehigh now sits on. The agreement has also enabled Delaware Nation to relocate an extension of their historic preservation office on Lehigh’s campus, which will facilitate the tribal nation’s work in the region and improve education about their history locally and beyond.

“Any time you can establish a formal relationship with a tribal nation, it’s a big deal,” said Sean M. Daley, a faculty member with the College of Health who directs the Institute for Indigenous Studies (IIS), which helped facilitate the partnership.

“When you look at the way Indigenous people and tribal nations are treated, they are left out of everything,” he said, explaining that Native Americans have not been included in most major health and educational studies. “Any time an academic institution can bring them into the fold and work with them, it’s a good thing."

Despite a long history of broken treaties and dispossession, these federally recognized Lenape tribal nations have maintained their sovereignty and ongoing relationships to their homelands, Lucas said. These nations work at the federal government-to-government level with the United States for the management and protection of their homelands.

Events leading up to the MOU signing included a meeting between Delaware Nation and Pennsylvania representatives, and the announcement of an Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) grant awarded to the Pennsylvania Tourism Office to engage with tribal communities relocated from Pennsylvania. The IIS will lead the project.

Sean Daley and his research partner and spouse, Christine Mokosky Daley, established the IIS at Lehigh’s College of Health in the fall of 2020. The IIS focuses on improving the health and educational attainment of Native people in the Americas. It employs an “holistic health approach” that aligns with the definition of health often used by Indigenous peoples themselves.

After the MOU signing on Friday, there was an open house at the IIS that featured Indigenous foods and dancing, and a launch of the Daleys’ latest book: “The Complexities of American Indian Identity in the Twenty-First Century.