To swoop in and seize land, resources, wealth, property, or territory from an Indigenous, native, or previously established population, then claim yourself or your group as the rightful owner of what was taken. The term can also describe benefiting from the displacement, exploitation, or dispossession of another population while ignoring or rewriting the
history of how that ownership was acquired.
The word "vultured" is derived from the behavior of a
vulture, which circles above an opportunity and swoops in to take advantage of
something after another party has already established possession or suffered a loss. In this sense, "vulturing" describes the act of opportunistically taking land, resources, or wealth from a population and then asserting ownership over what was acquired.
The term is commonly used in discussions of colonialism, Indigenous dispossession, land theft, imperialism, and exploitation. It emphasizes the act of taking
something from
people who were already living on or using it, displacing or marginalizing them, and then claiming
legal or moral ownership over what was taken.
“The colonizers vultured the Indigenous
people's
land, seized their resources, displaced their
people, and then declared themselves the rightful owners.”