Hunter-gatherers relied on megafauna for their subsistence. Those material conditions no longer exist: most land is under the control of state or private individuals and most of the megafauna are extinct. Rewilding looks to hunter-gatherers as an inspiration for adapting modern subsistence practices as best we can, to be more like that of our evolutionary past. While domestication was a stark turn away from hunting and gathering, pastoralism as an existing subsistence strategy is ripe for potential rewilding of various kinds. There are methods that combine human subsistence with ecological restoration to help increase biodiversity and carbon sequestration. A few of the current terms for this are regenerative agriculture, agro-forestry, and silva-pastoralism, holistic grazing, among others. In this episode I’ll be interviewing John and Laura, of Future Oak Farms, who manage multiple sites in Ireland, with multiple strategies.

Recording Date: 11/24/25

John Duffy was born in London to Irish parents who left Donegal during the wave of emigration in the 1960s. Disillusioned by the destructive logic of his career in oil and gas exploration, he began searching for an alternative path. In 2018, he returned to the family farm in Donegal and set about reimagining its future. Today, John co-runs the Future Oak Farm Project with his partner Laura. Guided by permaculture and regenerative design principles and using the Holistic Management Framework, the farm regenerates local ecosystems while sustaining a resilient, profitable enterprise—powered by a keen herd of Belted Galloways and billions of unseen allies beneath the soil.

Laura McGoran is a wellbeing facilitator, regenerative farming educator and co-manager of Future Oak Farm in Donegal. She has a corporate background in international sales and operations in the education sector, and later retrained in yoga, fitness and community health. She has worked closely with vulnerable groups by using movement, nature and practical food growing to support confidence and connection. On the farm she is involved in daily operations, ecology work and the storytelling that brings people into the regenerative journey.

Notes

Future Oak Farms Instagram

Future Oak Farm on YouTube

Island of Woods

Thirty Two Words for Field

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This episode is a crossover with Graham from Everyday Anarchism and Peter from The Rewilding Podcast. We conversed about rewilding, everyday anarchism, and a few of the connections between rewilding and anarchy. 

Everyday Anarchism
https://www.everydayanarchism.com/

The Rewilding Podcast
https://www.petermichaelbauer.com

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How hierarchy forms and gets stuck in a feedback loop is something that many people have a hard time grasping. Today I’m speaking with Luke Kemp, author of the book Goliath’s Curse: The History and Future of Societal Collapse. The book does an incredible job of outlining aspects of rewilding that I have been teaching for many years, in a succinct way that illuminated more things I hadn’t factored into the big picture. In this episode Luke and I have a wide ranging conversation, covering various aspects of his work and filling in some of the blanks for me.

Show Notes:

Luke’s Academic Profile

Goliath’s Curse

Luke Kemp Talk at Berkeley Economy and Society Initiative

The Art of Not Being Governed by James C. Scott

Nurturing Our Humanity by Riane Eisler and Douglas Fry

Monumental Architecture: A Thermodynamic Explanation of Symbolic Behaviour by Bruce G. Trigger

The Great Leveler by Walter Scheidel

The Sources of Social Power by Michael Mann

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If you’ve been looking for ways to engage with anthropology that are fun and easy to grasp, this is the podcast episode for you. Rewilding requires learning from humanity’s diverse past in order to shape our present and future in a way that is reciprocal with the land and each other. Anthropology can feel daunting and inaccessible to many people. From academic jargon to studies behind paywalls and the occasional pretentious practitioner. Social media provides a potential space for culturally savvy anthropologists to share uncommonly known positions and views in a fun and engaging way with people who are not versed in academia. On this episode of the podcast I’m speaking with Andie, the creator of the Ancestral Habits account on Instagram. Andie lays concepts out in ways that are easy to understand and interpret, and includes the proper citations for legitimacy. Something we need more of these days, especially on social media.

Andie has a degree in Anthropology and has worked in biomedical research development in Academia for over a decade.

Notes:

Website: https://www.ancestral-habits.com/

Substack:https://ancestralhabits.substack.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ancestralhabits/

• The Evolution of Complementary Cognition: Humans Cooperatively Adapt and Evolve through a System of Collective Cognitive Search

• Survival of the Sickest

• Invisible Rivals

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You often hear me speak about my rewilding 101 classes on the podcast. In this episode I’m speaking with my long time friend Calen Kennett, about our current project, which involves turning my class into an 8 part documentary film series and online companion course. We launched a kickstarter on April 1st to fund the project. We recorded this epsiode via instagram Live, so the audio is not as good as my normal podcast. If you want to help propel cultural rewilding to the forefront of public consciousness, please become a backer of our film series. You can find the link in the show notes, or simply go to kickstarter.com and search Rewilding 101.

Support our Kickstarter

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/villagevideo/rewilding-101-a-survival-strategy-for-humanity?ref=discovery&term=rewilding&total_hits=214&category_id=30

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Rewilding is a community effort. Many ancestral skills today are created with an individualist mindset, friction fire being one of them. But in older times, people worked together to create fire, understanding that community and togetherness was an important part of their survival. Such methods were known as the Neid Fire, Fire Churn, Tine Éigin, among others. Apprenticing to fire is a humbling experience, and learning to do it in tandem with others is a magical experience. To talk with me about this, I’m chatting with Ian Walton Larner and Aoife Ni Lodainn (Lowden) . 

Ian is passionate about rubbing sticks and started the Sacred Hearth Friction Fire project in 2016 to share skills and knowledge. Ian's primary focus is using friction fire within ritual and holistic practices drawing upon folklore, traditions and story. Fire has been key in the evolution and development of our species and Ian feels fire deserves to be welcomed in a respectful and honouring way. Ian is based in Bristol, South West England, UK

Aoife is a facilitator of ancestral & land-based courses, workshops & ceremonies. A big part of Aoife's work has been in uncovering & remembering the old traditions & relationship between people and fire in Ireland & Scotland.She is a devoted apprentice of fire, having tended sacred fires all over Ireland, the British Isles & beyond for the last 10 years. Aoife is an advocate for the healing, purifying & unifying nature of fire, how it can directly heal us, and create a space naturally for community to be formed. She is a Director & steward of the Shieling Collective, a grassroots project focused on reviving traditional skills & ancestral lifeways in the Highlands of Scotland.

Show Notes:

Ian's Links

Sacred Hearth Friction Fire Website

Sacred Hearth Friction Fire Instagram

Aoife’s Links

https://linktr.ee/aoifededanann?utm_source=ig&utm_medium=social&utm_content=link_in_bio

https://www.instagram.com/aoifededanann/

slinasinsear.com

theshielingcollective.com

Other Notes

Hearth and Campfire Influences on Arterial Blood Pressure: Defraying the Costs of the Social Brain through Fireside Relaxation

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10429110/

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Every once and a while I am happy and stunned to find an educational organization that makes me feel envious at the clear impact they are making on kids' lives, and the fun they are having along the way. For me, finding inspiration in other organizations that are keeping ancestral skills alive is an important part of running your own organization. Particularly, those that serve the next generation. In this episode I chat with Neal Ritter, a co-founder of the Laughing Coyote Project, a non-profit teaching earthskills in Colorado since 2007. Neal is happily a generalist, aiming to be above average in as many skills as possible. He is known for playing capture the flag with exuberance, and laughing loudly. Most importantly, he lives with his wife and two kids (who homeschool) on a twenty acre homestead they have the privilege of caretaking.

Notes:

Laughing Coyote Project

Boulder Outdoor Survival School

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Rewilding reconnects people to a regenerative relationship with the lands where we dwell. Many people live lives that are dramatically linked to technological modernity. A return to a less technologically dependent life is not possible (for them). Solar Punk offers a potential “transition” type of living that could help soften the blow of a collapsing industrial technological system–or may even represent a kind of sustainable futurism. To talk with me today about this is Andrew Sage. 

Andrew is a passionate writer, artist, and YouTuber hailing from the vibrant island nation of Trinidad & Tobago. As an ardent anarchist and firm believer in power to the people, Andrew has dedicated his efforts to invigorating imaginations and encouraging people to create a better world in the shell of the old.

Notes:

Andrew’s YouTube

Andrew’s Website

The Problem with Civilisation

We Need To Be More Tech Critical

Annual North American Rewilding Conference

Beyond Civilization by Daniel Quinn

Martin Prechtel Interview

Peter Gelderloos; We have all the solutions

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Am I Rewilder Enough? w/ Sheila Henson

Do you feel like a poseur when it comes to rewilding? Do you have guilty pleasures you can’t give up? Are you too overwhelmed to start rewilding? You’re not alone. In this episode I chat with my friend and Rewild Portland board member Sheila Henson about the judgments we face from others and (more often) ourselves that we perennially face in rewilding. From how we dress to our day to day choices, shame, guilt, and confusion can paralyze us or drive us away from going deeper into rewilding. But rewilding isn’t just the way you look, or what you do; it’s the stories we tell ourselves about the world and our place in it. How can we break the spell of purity and fundamentalism as we try to create more regenerative ways to live? Listen in to hear what Sheila and I think about this important topic.

Sheila Bio:

Sheila received her BA in History and an MA in Education, spent twelve years as a behavioral respite worker for children with special needs, working for many of those years at the Serendipity Center in Portland. Today she is an ADHD Coach, and is a well known and respected educator on tiktok. The drive to understand how to be kind, collaborative, and restorative within our social and ecological communities led her to Rewild Portland, where she now serves on the board of directors, heading up our transformative justice committee. Sheila and I also co-teach a Rewilding Your Health class through Rewild Portland.

Show Notes:

Sheila’s Website

Sheila’s TikTok

Sheila’s Instagram

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Camilla Power’s Book The Evolution of Culture

Guerrillas in the Industrial Jungle: Radicalism's Primitive and Industrial Rhetoric by Ursula McTaggart

Depression & Rewilding w/ Sheila Henson

In 'Dopamine Nation,' Overabundance Keeps Us Craving More

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For millions of years, and in some places still today, hunter-gatherers raise competent and capable children. They do this while navigating challenging environments, with predators, dangerous tools, and most notably: without any school. Contemporary societies have created learning environments that are a mismatch with the expectations of our genetic evolution: we weren’t meant to sit in boxes all day. The system of compulsory education that spans the globe and shapes our perception of education was designed in the 1700’s specifically to create dutiful factory workers for rising nationalism. They were not designed based on human evolution or human needs, but the needs of capitalist entrepreneurs looking to increase obedience and efficient producers of wealth for them. So then, if not in schools, how are we best adapted to learn? What does learning look like in societies without schools? If hunter-gatherers represent the way of life most closely to that which humans evolved in, what do they do to educate their children and prepare them for life as an adult? What can we learn about ourselves by studying these societies? To talk with me about this topic is Dr. Gul Deniz Salali.

Dr. Salali is a PhD in Evolutionary Anthropology. Since 2013, she has been conducting anthropological fieldwork with the Mbendjele BaYaka hunter-gatherers in the Congo rainforest, studying their social learning, cooperative childcare practices, and the cultural evolution of their plant knowledge. Her research projects explore the learning of ecological knowledge, childhood and childcare, and cultural evolution in hunter-gatherer communities.

Notes:
Dr. Gul Deniz Salali Website

Raising Tomorrow- BaYaka Hunter-Gatherer Childhoods and Global Perspectives on Child Development

Dumbing Us Down by John Taylor Gatto

Sand Talk by Tyson Yunkaporta

Hunt, Gather, Parent

Making by Tim Ingold

Mothers and Others by Sarah Hrdy

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