What, Exactly, Does “Unceded Territory” Even Mean?

From land acknowledgements to Twitter profiles, the term “unceded territory” is everywhere these days. A lot of people, however, are still not clear on what it means. There’s a lot of confusion over what “unceded” actually means, and yet, the concept is actually really easy to understand. There are two moving parts. One is widely known and understood, but the second is a little less well know. Once that second