Tuning in this morning to Listening to Indigenous Knowledge as Colleges and Universities: Building a Foundation, featuring Robin Wall Kimmerer, hosted by @michiganstateu #IndigenousCampus
Kimmerer starts of with gratitude to Mother Earth, who provides us everything we need, and shares images of plant & animal brothers and sisters during her talk to remind her of our many gifts.
Kimmerer reminds us instead of asking for more from Earth, instead of what we could "Gain" or "capitalize on", instead ask:

What does the Earth Ask of Us?
Kimmerer notes that she considers Indigenous Ways of Knowing both Ancient and Urgent.

I am LOVING this way of thinking.
Kimmerer brings us sweetgrass: how does it show strands of knowledge that contribute to our caring for Mother earth?
Plant knowledge, human knowledge—traditional knowledge, & scientific knowledge. 3 strands braided together. But traditional knowledge & Science aren't at odds.
Kimmerer draws parallels between her interview to study Botany at the collegiate level, telling her that her native knowledge was not "Science" to her grandfather's "re-education" at Indian Boarding Schools.

::low-whistle::
Kimmerer asks, "What Does Land Mean?"

Western: resources, capital, property, ecosystem services

Native: Land as identity, as sustainer, residence for hon-human relatives, ancestral connection, source of knowledge, healer, land as enspirited, home, Land as moral responsibility
Kimmerer: the plants are our oldest teachers: generous beings, models for how we might be in the world.

A shift: plants as objects (Western) >> plants as subjects (traditional)
Kimmerer reminds us of Anishinaabe ways of knowing: humans have 4 ways of understanding + making meaning of the world

mind, body, spirit, emotion
Kimmerer argues that much like genetic diversity fuels biological evolution, intellectual diversity will fuel cultural evolution.
Kimmerer calls on Mik'maq teachings: seeing and learning with two eyes. It is not a contest, it is Indigenous Knowledge AND western knowledge.
Kimmerer notes that the Inuit peoples were the first to note the ways that climate change was changing our food-webs. (I didn't know this-- so fascinating!)
Kimmerer is frequently referring directly to the students who are listening, speaking ever as an educator, encouraging botanists to learn always from the world around them.
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