Native American botany: plants are wise (audio)

SUNY Prof. Robin Wall Kimmerer (Center for Native Peoples and the Environment), host Krista Tippett (onbeing.org, 2-25-16), Xochitl, Dhr. Seven, CC Liu (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Native American botanist Dr. Kimmerer says science can study beauty (Vern/onbeing.org).

 

The Intelligence in All Kinds of Life

“Why is the world so beautiful?” This is a question Native American botanist Prof. Robin Wall Kimmerer pursues as a plant researcher and member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation.

She writes, “Science polishes the gift of seeing; indigenous traditions work with gifts of listening and language.”

An expert in moss -- a bryologist -- she describes mosses as the “coral reefs of the forest.”

Her work opens a sense of wonder and humility for the intelligence in all kinds of life we are used to naming and imagining as “it” when “inanimate” would do better to describe all nonhuman living beings.

Prof. Kimmerer says that as our knowledge about plant life unfolds, human vocabulary and imagination must adapt.

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GUEST: Robin Wall Kimmerer is the State University of New York Distinguished Teaching Professor at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse. She is founding director of the Center for Native Peoples and the Environment. Her books include Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses and Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants. Share Your Reflections
 

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