In a literal and legal sense, decolonization brings about the repatriation of Indigenous land and life.[iv] It is important to note here that Native American peoples are not mythical relics of the precolonial or pre-Columbian Americas. 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. 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. To what extent is permaculture practiced as a form of green missionary work throughout the world? Some of the greatest joys come from the understanding of reverence and the sacred. Is it this archetypal need to be the Hero that drives oppressive, patriarchal behaviors? I wrote about sovereignty in my work on the Heroines Journey, in relation to the age-old question, what do women want? I discussed the possibility that a womans heroic journey might have less to do with slaying the proverbial beast, and more to do with understanding, befriending, and co-existing with it. As designers of bioculturally diverse ecosystems,[xiv] how can we accomplish our goals of cultural, ecological and economic sustainability without contributing to the erasure of indigenous people and their lived experiences? We have really strong seeds. For me, it is a process of learning how I passively benefit from my racial and gender privilege. Commitment to Decolonizing Permaculture . 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. Thats exactly how I see indigenous food systems. And I am asking you to check that luggage at the door, to open your heart and mind to the possibility that these actions will benefit not just you as an individual, but also the global community, in ways that avoiding change and hoarding your privilege wont. What is Permaculture Design? Then come back and try again. 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. Amakiasu has been an educator for over 30 years. A-DAE: At the heart of the concept regeneration is wanting to renew and correct some of the missteps that have taken us to the point of environmental damage and degradation. It informs how I think about what part I can play to heal historical traumas. In order to be successful farmers, we have to learn how to adjust to those environmental changes from the beings in that natural environment. I dont tell you all of this to make you feel bad or to pity me. My mom, of Cree/Scottish heritage, who was beaten as a child and had me when she was 19, worked full-time-plus, at minimum wage, in a wide range of jobs. EarthShine also includes her Eco-Hood Design-and-Build Project along with Soulstice, which introduces young folks to careers theyve never heard of. This website uses Google Analytics and Meta (Facebook) Pixel to collect anonymous information such as the number of visitors to the site, and the most popular pages. Im asking people to stop and say, Look at how we think about agriculture in America and think about whether it included Indigenous People. The answer is it doesnt. What is my experience with this topic? There are many reports that say carbon sequestration is happening in indigenous stewarded lands. Cherokee) earth-based (non-European) language, and the common uses at Earthaven Ecovillage. The course will address the first four permaculture principles through the framework of African land-based wisdom. 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. Questions of what happens to present settler peoples is secondary to the act of returning Native land to Native peoples. Through this process of the design and management of ecosystems, we can regenerate ecological health by weaving patterns of beneficial relationships in ecosystems. And a true friend gives all of this back to you, and so much more. This machine is ecocidal because it destroys mountaintops and water wells with fracking and coal mining. These are systems that have been perfected because of relationships with other living beings, plants, animals, the land and everything that surrounds it; those relationships take time. Decolonization matters because it is the right thing to do in a moral sense. The Pueblo of Jemez said that the Caldera has always been sacred to the Jemez people, and they have always had continuous access. If its under your house and the machine needs it, it cares not who you are. They are not extinct. ARTY: What needs to happen to make the regenerative agriculture community more inclusive? And because of this they have a stake in the continuity of the colonial project. 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 Moore (2015) points out, "all life rebels against the value/monoculture nexus of modernity, from farm to . : Episode 97 Douglas Rushkoff, What Could Possibly Go Right? Tyson is a two-hearted and two-spirited person descended from the local indigenous matriarchy called the (A-ni-gi-lo-hi) based here in their aboriginal territory most commonly known as the Great Smoky Mountainsides. It is about learning what it means to be an ally, how to listen (especially when what I hear is emotionally challenging), and learning to give thanks always.We have to decolonize our minds before we can decolonize Native North America. He said that Western culture views the natural world as an it that can be exploited and processed. I submit that the framework of decolonization would also save permaculture from being one more happy-faced, green, eco-groovy front for the project of genocide. Faculty and SOIL Co-Founder A-DAE: Invite them to the table. My economic forms of production include designing, teaching, gardening and construction trades (carpentry, painting). : Episode 96 Kritee Kanko, What Could Possibly Go Right? An example of a novel ecosystem with forest garden polycultures and a diversity of plants and flowers. Im here to help make the world a more just and sustainable place for my daughter and all the other children in the world, those alive today as well as those of future generations. We offer partial scholarships (50% off) to black, indigenous and people of color (BIPOC) who otherwise would not be able to afford to attend. To what extent is permaculture a product of a settler people? Permaculture allows us to design productive loops of synergies between our technologically built environments and the surrounding ecologies within which we live. Whenever I get questions about agriculture, I always get a little squirmy because I realize most people are coming from the perspective of the American historical narrative where Indigenous People are excluded. Lee is a sustainability professional with twenty five years of experience envisioning, designing, and living innovative solutions to organic food systems, intentional community, and sustainability education. Arty Mangan Food and FarmingIndigeneity Article. How do Native voices become authentically included in the regenerative agriculture conversation? 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.. And we dont want you to feel bad about it. The same goes for traditional ecological knowledge. Thats the only way were going to ensure that we are within the cycle of whatever natural systems were a part of. Join us on this exploration of both the celebrations and the challenges of permaculture as seen through the lens of three marginalized voices. 9/29/21 - Dirt Time! Permaculture gives us the ability to design resilient homesteads, farms, villages, towns and economies so that we have the ability to weather the storms that come our way, whether they are economic or ecological in nature. I have tried to work on group certification for tribal communities, but again these are systems that are massive, and it takes way more than me to make really lasting change. Whether we turn our observational gaze to food systems, energy systems or economic and political systems, they are all overdue for a radical ecological revision. Decolonizing Permaculture Whitewashed Hope: A Message from Indigenous Leaders and Organizations on Regenerative Agriculture and Permaculture "Whitewashed Hope" is an open-source document intended for sharing. A-dae was interviewed by Arty Mangan, Director of the Bioneers Restorative Food Systems Program. [ii] In this article he interprets the racial homogeneity of the permaculture movement as a vulnerability. The conversation usually goes something like this: Settler/landowner: What can I do to help the poor?, Me: Gift me a piece of land, and I will turn it into a seed sanctuary, food forest, and permaculture paradise that will feed and benefit the community for generations.. Lee is a sustainability professional with twenty five years of experience envisioning, designing, and living innovative solutions to organic food systems, intentional community, and sustainability education. She is now focusing on her writing and on EarthShine, a business that exposes children and teens to the wonders of the natural world. You name it: housecleaning, selling jewelry, and, of course, growing and trimming marijuana (which is what probably eighty percent of West Coast activists and artists have done to sustain themselves for decades.). The first being the idea of collective resources. Permaculture certainly appears to have been assembled from toolkits from all over the world and throughout history. There is so much that we have to learn. In order to do that, we need to include Indigenous People. 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. By the time I dropped out in 10th grade at the age of 15, I had attended 19 different schools and lived in at least 30 different houses. For example, she Decolonizing Permaculture. 9/15/20 - Turning Fire Into Water: Fire Preparedness through Forest and Watershed Restoration. But counting carbon and counting molecules is not going to help people understand. Marina Nobre: Reforestation is more than plantingtrees. It made the unequal Britain we see today, Why we should abandon the concept of the climaterefugee, When decolonization meets post-capitalism: the third annual post-capitalism conference, From a Dystopian Present to a Gaian Future, Overcoming Colonial Thinking to Connect With Life, Degrowth, Decolonization and Modern Monetary Theory, Political polarization is pushing evangelicals to a historic breaking point, Why You Dont Hear Trump or Farage Talking About the Tech Revolution, What Could Possibly Go Right? Why should permaculture designers care? Permaculture is a process of understanding, analyzing and designing systems. Because some people have more financial means than others, we have created a sliding scale fee system to accommodate a range of economic realities. She served as garden educator and camp director at the Truly Living Well Center for Urban Agriculture for eight years. Decolonizing Permaculture Workshop Series Program This workshop has five two-hour sessions. A-DAE: Thats a loaded question because the whole idea of agriculture puts a contemporary spin on the conversation. People with more privilege than me have blown me off, forgotten to pay me, plagiarized my work, used my name to sell a PDC without hiring me to teach it, and even, as in the case with RealFarmacy and their smarmy Grow Food, Not Lawns Facebook page, tried to steal my trademark through the US Patent & Trademark Office. 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. Decolonizing Permaculture - A Letter From Starhawk Please give generously to support a more resilient and regenerative world. My family and I currently reside in occupied Penobscot territory, known as Midcoast Maine in the industrial nation-state known today as the United States (and this too, shall pass). I am deeply grateful for the space to explore this important topic in these pages, and I am grateful to the other participants in this conversation for their help in unpacking these ideas and figuring out how to apply them to our permaculture organizing efforts.