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John M. Flaxman Library SAIC School of the Art Institute of Chicago

Braiding Sweetgrass Research Guide

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About the Book

“Drawing on her life as an indigenous scientist, a mother, and a woman, Kimmerer shows how other living beings—asters and goldenrod, strawberries and squash, salamanders, algae, and sweetgrass—offer us gifts and lessons, even if we’ve forgotten how to hear their voices. In a rich braid of reflections that range from the creation of Turtle Island to the forces that threaten its flourishing today, she circles toward a central argument: that the awakening of a wider ecological consciousness requires the acknowledgment and celebration of our reciprocal relationship with the rest of the living world. For only when we can hear the languages of other beings will we be capable of understanding the generosity of the earth, and learn to give our own gifts in return.” — from Milkweed Editions

 

Reviews

A Review of Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass
Marion Agnew | Brevity | November 3, 2015

Honoring a ‘Covenant Of Reciprocity’
Nora Sissenich | The Science Survey | December 2, 2021

Radical Gratitude
Renuka Ramanujam | Scottish BPOC Writers Network | October 19, 2021
Science Alone Can’t Save Us
Susan Dawson-Cook | The Rauch Review | July 15, 2024

Woven Ways of Knowing
Mahin Hamilton | Open Rivers Journal | 2019

Interviews + Discussions

Robin Wall Kimmerer: The Intelligence of Plants [Audio]
Kimmerer, Robin Wall & Tippett, Krista | On Being with Krista Tippett | February 25, 2016

“Braiding Sweetgrass,” and a Lesson in Extreme Heat [Audio]
Kimmerer, Robin Wall & Sehgal, Paul | The New Yorker Radio Hour | August 25, 2023

You Don’t Have to Be Complicit in Our Culture of Destruction [Article]
Marchese, David | New York Times (Online) | Jan 30, 2023
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About Robin Wall Kimmerer

Robin Wall Kimmerer is a mother, scientist, decorated professor, and enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation. She is the author of The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants and Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses. She lives in Syracuse, New York, where she is a SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor of Environmental Biology, and the founder and director of the Center for Native Peoples and the Environment -- from the author’s website

 

Learn More

The Intelligence in All Kinds of Life [Podcast Episode]
Krista Tippet and Robin Wall Kimmerer | The On Being Project | 1 hr 3 min | Sep 2019