In her book Braiding Sweetgrass, author Robin Wall Kimmerer, a decorated environmental biology professor and a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation – a federally recognized tribe of the Potawatomi people in Oklahoma – weaves together her Indigenous roots and Western scientific expertise. Describing the relationship between people and the land as “the ultimate reciprocity, loving and being loved in return,” Braiding Sweetgrass is written as a collection of essays that read like a love letter to the land. Through her heartfelt personal stories and unwavering hope for the future, she invites readers to rekindle their connection with nature as an effort of restoration.
With tender care and respect, Kimmerer skillfully intertwines Indigenous teachings with Western scientific knowledge in her book, fostering the idea that they can harmoniously collaborate to enrich our appreciation and care for the natural world. This is exemplified in her discussion of the concept of reciprocity, a deep-rooted Indigenous teaching defined as a mutually beneficial relationship between people and the world. She illustrates this effectively using examples in nature such as sweetgrass, a plant sacred to many Indigenous nations. She describes the moderate harvest – and not overharvest nor underharvest – of sweetgrass as a long-standing cultural practice of Indigenous nations, and this approach has ensured the survival of sweetgrass, highlighting the co-dependent relationship of the people and the plant. Scientifically, Kimmerer explains this phenomenon as compensatory growth, in which moderate harvest creates space and light for additional shoots to flourish. Through this, she underscores the value in listening to both worlds of knowledge. While Indigenous practice is centered on listening to the land as the teacher, the Western scientific method of environmental stewardship is to observe the land as a study subject. Despite the differing methodologies, they share a common objective. Kimmerer proposes a union of both, suggesting that “doing science with care and humility is a powerful act of reciprocity with the more-than-human-world”.
While science is often read without emotions, Kimmerer imbues her storytelling with soul, gently drawing you in and instilling in you a deep appreciation of nature, one that mirrors her own. She does this by seamlessly weaving in her personal anecdotes with stories of nature, often drawing parallels between the two. This is exemplified in the chapter titled “The Consolation of Water Lilies”, in which she shares her sadness when her children leave home. To find solace, she paddles out into a pond and finds comfort in the water lilies. She sees the way daughter lily pads are connected to the mother lily pads via a life-sustaining air-filled capillary system and how they mirror her relationship with her daughters –
“Forever linked in one long breath, an inhalation that calls for reciprocal exhalation, nourishing the common root from which they both arose”.
Through this, she highlights our similarity to the natural world, encouraging us to view nature as part of our own community in need of our care as opposed to a separate entity from which we draw resources.
Kimmerer’s love for nature comes with it both joy and grief, yet she remains hopeful. She writes about the grief of loss of connection with the land and her culture as an aftermath of colonization. Instead of assuaging the grief with anger, she proposes an alternative way of comfort — through “rebuilding the homeland that was taken”. She is hopeful as she writes about the resilience of the Indigenous communities and their efforts to reconnect the land with the people. One example she describes is the ongoing advocacy work by the Onondaga Nation to restore the Onondaga Lake in New York, a once-clear lake full of biodiversity now made uninhabitable from wastewater pollution. Despite her grief, she still holds light for the future. Her novel, Braiding Sweetgrass, is a testament to her hope and love for the land. Through her poetic language and tender tone, Kimmerer invites her readers with love and open arms to use their personal strengths to help heal the relationship between people and the land.
Braiding Sweetgrass is available at the Toronto Public Library as physical copies, ebook, and audiobook (narrated by Robin Wall Kimmerer herself!)
Kitty Liu
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- Book Review – “Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants”, by Robin Wall Kimmerer - January 30, 2024
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