How can we incorporate Indigenous ways of knowing into our scientific understanding of the natural world? While native and western science often seem at odds with one another, botanist, professor, and enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, Robin Wall Kimmerer shares how bridging the gap between these two perspectives helps us understand the earth in a more holistic way. In this discussion with poet and professor Brandy Nālani McDougall, Kimmerer unpacks her research journey in ethnic ecology, land justice, and indigenous knowledge. Their discussion dives into topics that include indigenous science, cultural erasure and preservation, plant culture, and restoration of relationships to land.

Botanist, professor, and enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, Robin Wall Kimmerer is the author of Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants. A SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor of Environmental Biology and the founder of the Center for Native Peoples and the Environment, Kimmerer has won the John Burroughs Medal for outstanding nature writing and a MacArthur “genius” grant. Her research interests include the restoration of ecological communities, as well as the restoration of our relationships to land.

Brandy Nālani McDougall is a Kānaka ʻŌiwi author, educator, activist, and the Hawai'i State Poet Laureate for 2023–2025. She is an Associate Professor of American studies at the University of Hawaii at Manoa specializing in Indigenous Studies. 

Sound editing by Amika Matteson. Graphic by Taylor Hansen.

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