decolonizing permaculture
This machine is ecocidal because it destroys mountaintops and water wells with fracking and coal mining. (Think of Rainbow family, New Age Plastic Shamans, and pretindians. Remember the permaculture principles: Respond to feedback; Designer limits the yield; Problems are solutions; Mistakes are tools for learning. So, that means, I need to plant more. Were adjusting to our environment rather than trying to keep everything out. Learning Adventures with Earthaven Ecovillage, Saturdays, May 22 June 19 11am 1pm Eastern Time. Im not tooting my own horn here, only illuminating my own body of work as an example of how effective a person can be, even if they didnt start out with much. We need to be aware of white fragility if we start feeling defensive during racially charged conversations. We have to have reverence and respect for those unknowns. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak outBecause I was not a Jew. And again, if somebody has enough money, they can play the buffoon and get away with it. To decolonize regenerative agriculture, we have to go back and think about the times before European settlement and contact to the times when there was more of a balance in the ecological environments that were trying to correct now. SOIL is the educational branch of the Earthaven Tree. Permaculture is a fantastic curriculum and a beautiful pedagogy a wonderful system of knowledge that has been distilled down from a much larger traditional ecological body of knowledge originating all around the world and I think many of us within the movement acknowledge that. Those stories are the guideposts that need to be laid out before we even start digging into the soil. We dont need a Hero. We can whisper the names of the beasts: racism, sexism, ageism, xenophobia, misogyny, hate, fear, anger we all experience these things from time to time, and we see the resulting backlash and judgmental attitudes. The easy absorption, adoption, and transposing of decolonization is yet another form of settler appropriation. I do believe that most people wake up in the morning wanting to be good people and to do good work in the world, regardless of their race, class, gender, age, or what they eat for breakfast. There is so much that we have to learn. No portion of the original content on this website may be reproduced, in any language, without express written consent. Are you telling us that the Jemez people have been going over this fence? And the Jemez governors response was, I thought that fence was to keep the elk in not to keep the Indians out.. A-DAE: One of the reasons I entered into the organic community was because organic uses less chemicals to create a food system, and the use of those things by industrial agriculture really worried me. You need to become embraced in that system in order to create not only a healthy food system, but also healthy people, a healthy environment, and a happy mental state. A-DAE: Invite them to the table. The first being the idea of collective resources. Wikipedia; Wikipedias Plastic shaman entry; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plastic_shaman, FreeFactFinder; FreeFactFinders Pretindian entry; http://freefactfinder.com/definition/Pretindian.html. Permaculture Womens Guild by Heather Jo Flores As Published in issue #98 of Permaculture Design Magazine, November 2015 First of all, I want to say that I do not represent anyone but myself, and though I have vetted this article with several peers and mentors, I do not presume to know the needs and desires of anyone else. A-DAE: Yes. She is now focusing on her writing and on EarthShine, a business that exposes children and teens to the wonders of the natural world. How can we translate and communicate that to members of our colonial culture who may have forgotten? We are a very young society and nation. It is an ethically bounded framework of ecological design that can be used to design everything from landscapes and farms to business enterprises and other cultural projects, on nearly any scale. As a community steeped in the ecological design model known as Permaculture, Earthaven is taking a good long look at the ways in which the "Earth Care, People Care, Fair Share" movement has fallen short on the inclusion of black and brown voices, on addressing systemic injustices, on acknowledging where most land-based wisdom has originated. One of the design methods used in permaculture that takes place early on in a site design is Zone and Sector Analysis. In this article we will seek to answer the following questions: What is decolonization? I am here to learn how to be of better service to all people. [ii] In this article he interprets the racial homogeneity of the permaculture movement as a vulnerability. Resilience is a program of Post Carbon Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping the world transition away from fossil fuels and build sustainable, resilient communities. I grew up with my sister and our single mom. When that happens, people are disconnected from society and from the collective resources that go into making food. If you identify as BIPOC and would like to receive a full or partial scholarship, please contact us at info@schoolofintegratedliving.org. A-DAE: Thats a loaded question because the whole idea of agriculture puts a contemporary spin on the conversation. The interactions between climate change, energy peak and economic contraction mean that the stakes are very high. Rather than being burdened with that task, the idea that we respect the unknown helps people deal with it. 5/7/22 - Our Permaculture Community Comes Together - A Reflection on Weekend One of the PDC. Thats exactly how I see indigenous food systems. Saturdays, May 22 - June 19 11am - 1pm EST Online. 4/7/21 - Decolonizing Permaculture. It was the system that separated and allowed for a lot of injustice that occurred with land theft, slavery and indentured servitude. In light of Earth Care, People Care and Future Care, how can this be a valuable concept? We are probably the youngest species on our planet and in our environments; the trees and the plants and the animals are much older. When you look at the whole of time, it becomes overwhelming. We need to be relevant. This critique is offered to make the evolution of our movement cleaner and more respectful of indigenous cultures, and to find a way to balance Leaver and Taker[xi] cultures, maybe even to unify them. : Episode 96 Kritee Kanko, What Could Possibly Go Right? Pomo people do different things than Navajo people. However, it seems to me that there are ripples of injustice coursing through the permaculture community, manifesting as a pattern of landowners and/or self-proclaimed leaders doing things that hurt, offend, oppress, and devalue others. First of all, I want to say that I do not represent anyone but myself, and though I have vetted this article with several peers and mentors, I do not presume to know the needs and desires of anyone else. This is known as the tangled triad of settlernativesettler of color. [xi] Daniel Quinn, Ishmael (Bantam/Turner, 1992) and Beyond Civilization (Harmony, 1999). Ive tried. For instance, my grandpa would take me to the field and tell a story about the last time he saw conditions like this and what his grandparents did. [v] Ideally this process should be done without strings attached. someone with experience in conveying and working with these kinds of topics. Decolonizing Permaculture: Bridging the gap between privilege and oppression by Heather Jo Flores A low-income community in Indiana, coming together to build a shared garden in somebody's front yard. Decolonization matters because of mountaintop removal, water mining and fracking. Science rather than trying to count carbon, should work to explain to the Western scientific world why these stewarded places are so important and why these practices should be continued. As I reflected on how I could be relevant to communities of color close to where I am located in rural Maine (which is mostly white), I started thinking about making bridges with Native American communities to the north. If we genuinely care about the regeneration of ecosystems and culture, we should talk more openly about this tension of owning stolen land,[viii] especially when seeking relationships with contemporary Native peoples. Friendships require vulnerability, compassion, patience, and most of all, effort. Some open questions I still have revolve around issues of permaculture and its relationship to colonization. They know how to see the health of the soil without needing a microscope. Allan Savory, the founder of holistic livestock management, was criticized by scientists because initially he didnt use scientific metrics to measure his success, but instead he used the overall improved health and biodiversity of the landscape. When youre trying to move an entire community of white people and as a non-white person, it is really, really hard and tiring. Onward to regeneration of healthy systems! It doesnt include indigenous people because only colonizers and settlers are considered farmers in America. An example of a novel ecosystem with forest garden polycultures and a diversity of plants and flowers. Our intention is to invite proponents of western ecological agriculture (e.g., regenerative ag / permaculture) to go deeper and encourage their peers to go deeperto not just 'take' practices from Indigenous cultures without their context, but to also encompass the deeper Indigenous worldviews inspiring a consciousness shift that hopefully will I am a permaculture designer, gardener, activist and teacher. But the real remedy is more diverse above-and-below ground living systems. And as you describe, the thrust is to kill off the pests, kill off the weeds, destroy and kill and create the monocrop. And because of this they have a stake in the continuity of the colonial project. On the surface, permaculture is often about designing eco-groovy, perennially edible landscapes, gardens and farms. This lack of discernment is a blind spot. ARTY: Relationships in indigenous ways are central. In this sense, there is broad overlap between movements for social justice and anti-racism. Exploring the Intersection of Permaculture and Decolonization. Exploring the Permaculture Principles through an Equity Lens. We need to give thanks always. The Earth is not actually dying. Something to think about. The word 'permaculture' was coined by Australians Bill Mollison and David Holmgren in the 1970s, from " permanent agriculture," but has come to encompass many sorts of systems: "permanent culture.". Jesse Watson is a permaculture designer, teacher and builder living and working in Midcoast Maine, occupied Penobscot territory. The reason for this relates to a concept in the article Decolonization is not a metaphor, which the authors call settler moves to innocence. A move to innocence is a diversionary attempt by a settler person to absolve themself of the guilt of living on stolen land using some form of catharsis, without actually addressing the difficult societal structures involved. kcet.org/shows/tending-nature/the indigenous science of permaculture. Opening a heartfelt dialogue with life-A film review of Into The Soil, Start Where You are: Discovery at Zone 00, Explaining regeneration and its expansion beyond the limits ofculture. In contemporary agriculture, there are individualized, commodified resources like land, you can buy water, at one point in our history you could even buy somebodys body and health. Think about what it means to be a true friend to somebody. When we talk about decolonizing regenerative agriculture, we are looking at that initial definition. In the 1930s and again in the 60s, The National Resource Conservation Service came in and put in elk and deer-proof fences. I most often hear the term decolonization used in discussions about race, class, and privilege. How can we tend our own council fires in service to the community? In another sense, a cultural sense, decolonization is about the process of removing colonizing thoughts from your own mind and colonizing behavior from your own lifeway. ARTY: I heard you tell the story of assisting your grandfather filling out an organic certification application and to the question of what inputs do you use, he said prayers, love, river water.. We should ask how we can be relevant to their lives, and ask for permission and endorsement of our activities and events. Scientific inquiry and the scientific field is fairly young compared to the natural systems that were trying to mimic. Also, places that have been stewarded and kept by California indigenous basket-weavers, those are the places where carbon is probably its most healthy. When we farm, were thinking about natural cycles, and how do we become more embedded into those natural systems. Join us on this exploration of both the celebrations and the challenges of permaculture as seen through the lens of three marginalized voices. See the link below for her article and invitation to. Because some people have more financial means than others, we have created a sliding scale fee system to accommodate a range of economic realities. Download a sample from the Decolonizing Permaculture issue here (19MB). Decolonizing permaculture June 2, 2022 Public domain The dreamcatcher is one of the most widely appropriated symbols. The industrial machine is genocidal because it kills off whole nations and peoples. Indigenous People have created the idea of the unknown and the sacred and reverence for where we are as the youngest entity in this place. Recently, a friend and colleague pointed out that decolonization is not a metaphor. That stunned me. I dont have any firm answers, but I know that asking these difficult questions causes an uneasy and unsettling feeling. Those stories are just as important as the practices or the l hoe that I pick up. 3 (2011): 54-70. http://libjournal.uncg.edu/ijcp/article/view/249/116, Robin DiAngelo, White Fragility: Why Its So Hard to Talk to White People About Racism, The Good Men Project, April 9, 2015: http://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/white-fragility-why-its-so-hard-to-talk-to-white-people-about-racism-twlm/. Lee Warren Friendships ask for justice, equality, non-violence, respect, and communication. Unfortunately, it is all too common for landowners in the permaculture world to treat their tenants, interns, and volunteers like peasant-slaves, and again, to justify it with excuses about how the work is so important for the world. But the federal agency said, Theres a fence there, and it says no trespassing. EarthShine also includes her Eco-Hood Design-and-Build Project along with Soulstice, which introduces young folks to careers theyve never heard of. In order to better understand the concrete ways in which permaculture can be colonizing and generally problematic within the context of social justice, it is important to get the facts from a reliable source i.e. My grandpas response was: Were farmers. And it isnt even accurate to say merely that the economic-political system is flawed, because it seems more accurate to say that it is deeply corrupt. Ferguson points out that the mostly homogenous demographic makeup of the permaculture movement is a weakness. Is it possible that we can subvert patterns of abuse and oppression by forming honest, lifelong friendships across the divides? ARTY: In the webinar you hosted as part of a First Nations Development Institute series on land stewardship, you said that agroecology is a non-indigenous term; its an interpretation of an indigenous way of farming, but not an interpretation by Indigenous People. How can we expect to design a regenerative legacy for our descendants if we havent yet made peace with the ancestors? : Episode 95 Geneen Marie Haugen. How do we incorporate righting this egregious, unresolved, and ongoing historical crime into our culture jamming work? I have work to do, wrote one permaculture teacher who is known to be especially abusive. She is now focusing on her writing and on EarthShine, a business that exposes children and teens to the wonders of the natural world. I maintain a permaculture design/build practice for residential and farm clients. I thought it was fascinating, the idea that you pretty much kill everything so that nothing living goes inside your body as a preventative to making you sick. More importantly, though, permaculture gives us the ability to heal and regenerate ecosystems through right relationship to all the other beings around us: plants, animals (including humans), wind, water, rocks, soils and so on. Well explore how the concepts of colonization, power-over, and dominator thinking have pervaded modern culture and offer suggestions about how to move towards a more holistic, equitable, integrated, and life-centered mindset. There are stark differences between agricultural systems in indigenous communities and agricultural systems in contemporary communities. He helps facilitate PDCs with Lisa Fernandes of The Resilience Hub. 9/15/20 - Turning Fire Into Water: Fire Preparedness through Forest and Watershed Restoration. This idea of exploitation puts us in the position that we have to manage everything with the right to commodify things that should never be commodified. Center for Communication and Civic Engagement, Culture Jamming and Meme-based Communication. https://depts.washington.edu/ccce/polcommcampaigns/CultureJamming.htm, [ii] Rafter Sass Ferguson, Critical Questions, Early Answers, Permaculture Activist 93 (Autumn 2014): http://liberationecology.org/critical-questions-early-answers/, Robin DiAngelo, White Fragility, The International Journal of Critical Pedagogy 3, no. Decolonizing permaculture also means building relationships with extra-human nature that acknowledges the ways in which they, too, resist the hegemony of corporate capitalism - and this means also acting in solidarity with them. Decolonizing . And when we publicly use ceremonies or songs from other cultures, we must be absolutely clear exactly how we got permission to use those ceremonies or songs. Decolonization is about upholding longstanding treaties, adherence to international law, and the return of genuine sovereignty and the administration of land use to First Nations peoples.
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