Friends General Conference

Together we nurture the spiritual vitality of Friends

The Teachings of Grass

The Miami Friends Meeting is continuing its series of programs considering how people are facing new climate realities. Please come participate in another special Meeting for Learning, this Sunday at 9:30 a.m (March 5, 2017 - the first Firstday of the month). We plan to view a recorded presentation featuring Robin Kimmerer, Distinguished Teaching Professor and Director, Center for Native Peoples and the Environment of the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry. Selected readings and links for additional education will be provided, and we intend to have ample time for discussion. The YouTube recording is 

"Mishkos Kenomagwen: The Teachings of Grass" published on Nov 5, 2014

"Indigenous peoples worldwide honor plants, not only as our sustainers, but as our oldest teachers who share teachings of generosity, creativity, sustainability and joy. By their living examples, plants spur our imaginations of how we might live. By braiding indigenous traditional ecological knowledge with modern tools of botanical science, Robin Kimmerer, professor of Environmental Science and Forestry, of Potawatomi ancestry, explores the question: 'If plants are our teachers, what are their lessons, and how might we become better students?'"

      Dr. Kimmerer is a mother, a plant ecologist, a published author (many Friends are reading her book BRAIDING SWEETGRASS) and a SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse, New York. She is also a warm and engaging teller of stories, reporter of observations and wise presence in the woods of North America.

[Brian, if you have room, you can include this as additional information about Robin Kimmerer]

      Dr. Kimmerer serves as the founding Director of the Center for Native Peoples and the Environment whose mission is to create programs which draw on the wisdom of both indigenous and scientific knowledge for our shared goals of sustainability. Her research interests include the role of traditional ecological knowledge in ecological restoration and the ecology of mosses. In collaboration with tribal partners, she and her students have an active research program in the ecology and restoration of plants of cultural significance to Native people. She is active in efforts to broaden access to environmental science education for Native students, and to create new models for integration of indigenous philosophy and scientific tools on behalf of land and culture. She is engaged in programs which introduce the benefits of traditional ecological knowledge to the scientific community, in a way that respects and protects indigenous knowledge.

      Dr. Kimmerer has taught courses in botany, ecology, ethnobotany, indigenous environmental issues as well as a seminar in application of traditional ecological knowledge to conservation. She is the co-founder and past president of the Traditional Ecological Knowledge section of the Ecological Society of America.  Dr. Kimmerer serves as a Senior Fellow for the Center for Nature and Humans. She is of European and Anishinaabe ancestry, and is an enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation.

Sunday, March 5, 2017 - 9:30am to 10:30am
Miami Friends Meeting Meetinghouse (Quakers)
1185 Sunset Drive
Coral Gables, FL 33146
United States
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