Robin Wall Kimmerer

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Robin Wall Kimmerer
Born1953 (age 67–68)
Alma materBS, SUNY-ESF
MS, PhD, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Known forher scholarship on traditional ecological knowledge, and moss ecology; outreach to tribal communities; creative writing
AwardsJohn Burroughs Medal Award, for Gathering Moss
Scientific career
FieldsPlant ecology, Botany
InstitutionsSUNY-ESF; Centre College; Transylvania University
ThesisVegetation Development and Community Dynamics in a Dated Series of Abandoned Lead-Zinc Mines in Southwestern Wisconsin (1983)
Websitewww.esf.edu/faculty/kimmerer/

Robin Wall Kimmerer (born 1953) is an American Distinguished Teaching Professor of Environmental and Forest Biology; and Director, Center for Native Peoples and the Environment, at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry (SUNY-ESF).

She is the author of numerous scientific articles, and the books Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses (2003), and Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants (2013). An audiobook version was released in 2016, narrated by the author. Braiding Sweetgrass was republished in 2020 with a new introduction.

She is an enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation,[1] and combines her heritage with her scientific and environmental passions.

The Potawatomi tribe originated and has remained in the Great Lakes region for around four centuries. They have similar ethnic origin to the Ojibwe and Ottawa tribes. These three tribes organized a treaty known as the Three Fires Confederacy. In the Confederacy, the Potawatomi were known to be the “Keepers of the Sacred Fire”. This entailed that they were the leading tribe out of the alliance between the three Indian nations. Their language is Central Algonquin, which is very similar to the language of the Ojibwe tribe and Ottawa tribe as well. In the Potawatomi language, they refer to themselves as “Nishnabek”. In English “Nishnabek” means people.

In the 1800s, Americans significantly reduced the Potawatomi’s land west of Mississippi. When the American settlers removed the Potawatomi tribe, they split into two groups and relocated. One group went to Southwestern Iowa and the other went to Eastern Kansas. Eventually the two groups merged again in 1846 in Topeka, Kansas. Aside from these two groupings, some Potawatomi people refused to leave and remained in the Great Lakes region. In addition, the Potawatomi tribe, like many other tribes, have spread all across the United States and Canada since then.

The Potawatomi tribe were known for being hunter/gatherers. The men in the tribe were the hunters and the women were the gatherers, implying that they tended to the plants/garden. The Potawatomi were considered hunter/gatherers because of their northern location, which was very favorable in terms of good growing conditions. Their diet consisted of wild game that they caught, fish, wild rice, red oak acorns, and maple syrup. When some Potawatomi members were forced to relocate to Wisconsin, they learned from other local tribes how to live off the land in other ways. Tribes such as the Kickapoo, Winnebago, Fox, and Saux tribe taught the Potawatomi how to tend to corn, beans and squash. These three vegetables hold high value in indigenous cultures and are referred to as “The Three Sisters”.

The Potawatomi tribe started at a population around 8,000 to 15,000 members. In the 1600s–1700s that number significantly dropped to around 1,200 to 3,400 due to war, relocation, etc. Since then, their current population today was risen to almost 28,000 people in all of Canada and the United States.


Early life and education[]

Robin Wall Kimmerer was born in 1953 in the open country of upstate New York to Robert and Patricia Wall. She grew up playing in the countryside, and her time outdoors rooted a deep appreciation for the natural environment. Her enthusiasm for the environment was encouraged by her parents, who while living in upstate New York began to reconnect with their Potawatomi heritage, where now Kimmerer is a citizen of the Potawatomi Nation.

Kimmerer remained near home for college, attending ESF and receiving a bachelor's degree in botany in 1975. She spent two years working for Bausch & Lomb as a microbiologist. Kimmerer then moved to Wisconsin to attend the University of Wisconsin–Madison, earning her master's degree in botany there in 1979, followed by her PhD in plant ecology in 1983. It was while studying forest ecology as part of her degree program, that she first learnt about mosses, which became the scientific focus of her career.[2]

Career[]

Rainforest Moss

From Wisconsin, Kimmerer moved to Kentucky, where she taught briefly at Transylvania University in Lexington before moving to Danville, Kentucky when she taught biology, botany, and ecology at Centre College. Kimmerer received tenure at Centre College. In 1993, Kimmerer returned home to upstate New York and her alma mater, ESF, where she currently teaches.

Kimmerer teaches in the Environmental and Forest Biology Department at ESF. She teaches courses on Land and Culture, Traditional Ecological Knowledge, Ethnobotany, Ecology of Mosses, Disturbance Ecology, and General Botany. Director of the newly established  at ESF, which is part of her work to provide programs that allow for greater access for Native students to study environmental science, and for science to benefit from the wisdom of Native philosophy to reach the common goal of sustainability.[3]

He Carlisle arrow and Red Man Published by the U.S. Indian School at Carlisle, PA. 1918.jpg

Kimmerer is a proponent of the Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) approach, which Kimmerer describes as a "way of knowing." TEK is a deeply empirical scientific approach and is based on long-term observation. However, it also involves cultural and spiritual considerations, which have often been marginalized by the greater scientific community. Wider use of TEK by scholars has begun to lend credence to it.

Kimmerer's efforts are motivated in part by her family history. Her grandfather was a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, and received colonist schooling at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. The school, similar to Canadian residential schools, set out to "civilize" Native children,  forbidding residents from speaking their language, and effectively erasing their Native culture. Knowing how important it is to maintain the traditional language of the Potawatomi, Kimmerer attends a class to learn how to speak the traditional language because "when a language dies, so much more than words are lost."[4][5]

Her current work spans traditional ecological knowledge, moss ecology, outreach to tribal communities, and creative writing.

Professional service[]

Kimmerer has helped sponsor the Undergraduate Mentoring in Environmental Biology (UMEB) project, which pairs students of color with faculty members in the enviro-bio sciences while they work together to research environmental biology. Kimmerer is also a part of the United States Department of Agriculture's . The program provides students with real-world experiences that involve complex problem-solving. Kimmerer is also involved in the American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES), and works with the Onondaga Nation's school doing community outreach. Kimmerer also uses traditional knowledge and science collectively for ecological restoration in research. She has served on the advisory board of the (SEEDS) program, a program to increase the number of minority ecologists. Kimmerer is also the former chair of the Ecological Society of America Traditional Ecological Knowledge Section.

In April 2015, Kimmerer was invited to participate as a panelist at a United Nations plenary meeting to discuss how harmony with nature can help to conserve and sustainably use natural resources, titled "Harmony with Nature: Towards achieving sustainable development goals including addressing climate change in the post-2015 Development Agenda."[6][7]

Honors and awards[]

Kimmerer received the John Burroughs Medal Award for her book, Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses.[8] Her first book, it incorporated her experience as a plant ecologist and her understanding of traditional knowledge about nature. Her second book, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, received the 2014 Sigurd F. Olson Nature Writing Award.[9] By 2021 over 500,000 copies had been sold worldwide. [2] Braiding Sweetgrass is about the interdependence of people and the natural world, primarily the plant world. She won a second Burroughs award for an essay, "Council of the Pecans," that appeared in Orion magazine in 2013.[10] Kimmerer received an honorary M. Phil degree in Human Ecology from College of the Atlantic on June 6, 2020.[11]

Books[]

  • Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses (Oregon State University Press, 2003) ISBN 0-87071-499-6.
  • Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants (Milkweed Editions, 2013) ISBN 9781571313355.

References[]

History. (n.d.). Retrieved April 4, 2021, from https://www.pokagonband-nsn.gov/our-culture/history

Potawatomi history. (n.d.). Retrieved April 4, 2021, from https://www.mpm.edu/content/wirp/ICW-152

Sultzman, L. (December 18, 1998). Potawatomi History. Retrieved April 6, 2021, from http://www.tolatsga.org/pota.html

CPN Public Information Office. (November 3, 2015). Q & A With Robin Wall Kimmerer, Ph.D. Citizen Potawatomi Nation. https://www.potawatomi.org/q-a-with-robin-wall-kimmerer-ph-d/


Notes[]

  1. ^ "Writers-in-Residence Program: Robin Kimmerer." Archived April 2, 2013, at the Wayback Machine HJ Andrews Experimental Forest. 2004. Retrieved July 17, 2012.
  2. ^ Jump up to: a b "Robin Wall Kimmerer: 'Mosses are a model of how we might live'". the Guardian. June 19, 2021. Retrieved June 19, 2021.
  3. ^ "Robin W. Kimmerer | Environmental and Forest Biology | SUNY-ESF". www.esf.edu. Retrieved February 20, 2021.
  4. ^ Wall., Kimmerer, Robin, Braiding sweetgrass : indigenous wisdom, scientific knowledge and the teachings of plants, ISBN 978-0-221-05883-7, OCLC 1155921718, retrieved February 20, 2021
  5. ^ "Robin Wall Kimmerer | Americans Who Tell The Truth". www.americanswhotellthetruth.org. Retrieved February 20, 2021.
  6. ^ "Kimmerer to Speak at U.N.—Professor to join conversation on 'Harmony with Nature' via SUNY-ESF.
  7. ^ Video at [1] UN Video, Kimmerer's remarks begin at 57 min.
  8. ^ List of John Burroughs Medal Award Winners
  9. ^ Hertzel, Laurie. "Braiding Sweetgrass" wins Sigurd Olson nature writing award, Star Tribune, May 7, 2014.
  10. ^ See John Burroughs Nature Essay Award for 2013 to Robin Wall Kimmerer
  11. ^ See Mother, scientist, decorated professor, Citizen Potawatomi Nation member, and award-winning author Robin Wall Kimmerer, Ph.D. will deliver the keynote address during an online graduation ceremony for the College of the Atlantic Class of 2020.

Further reading[]

External links[]

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