A conversation with Robin Wall Kimmerer

In a powerful and grounding conversation, Shayla sits down with Robin Wall Kimmerer to explore the deep connections between Indigenous wisdom, language, and the natural world. Together, they reflect on how our relationship with the Earth is not only ecological but relational, spiritual, and intergenerational.

The Strength of the Earth and the Power of Plants

Robin shares her lifelong journey of understanding the strength of the Earth through plants. As both a scientist and an enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, she bridges Indigenous knowledge and Western science, showing that plants are not merely resources but teachers.

Her work, including Braiding Sweetgrass, emphasizes that wider ecological understanding stems from listening to the Earth’s oldest teachers: the plants around us. Through story and science, she reminds us that the land is not a commodity but a relative.

Language as Medicine

A central theme in the conversation is the power of language. Robin speaks about how the words we use shape our relationship with the living world. When we describe nature as “it,” we create distance. When we recognize plants, waters, and animals as beings, we begin to repair that distance.

Language becomes medicine. It restores relationship.

Childhood, Curiosity, and Responsibility

Robin reflects on her childhood connection to nature and how curiosity nurtures belonging. Children are instinctively drawn to the living world. Protecting that curiosity is essential, especially in a time of ecological crisis.

With curiosity comes responsibility. We are not separate from the land. We are accountable to it. The conversation gently but clearly reminds us that care for the Earth is not optional. It is reciprocal.

Intergenerational Knowledge and Embodied Healing

Indigenous knowledge systems carry generations of ecological understanding. Robin speaks to the importance of intergenerational teaching and the ways that healing is both cultural and embodied.

Time on the land is not just restorative in a wellness sense. It is relational repair. Healing happens when we remember we belong to something larger.

Grounding in Urban Spaces

The conversation also acknowledges the realities of urban living. Not everyone has access to forests or farms. Yet even in cities, relationship is possible. A small garden, a street tree, or a balcony plant can become a site of connection.

Resilience is built through ritual and service. Small acts, repeated with intention, create grounding.

Two-Eyed Seeing

Robin discusses the concept of “two-eyed seeing,” a framework that integrates Indigenous and Western knowledge systems. It invites us to hold both ways of knowing with respect and humility.

Rather than positioning science and Indigenous knowledge as opposites, two-eyed seeing recognizes their shared goals of sustainability and care.

Indigenous Futurism and Land Back

The conversation closes with a call for grassroots environmental action and support for Land Back movements. For Robin, restoration is not only ecological. It is relational. Healing the land requires restoring Indigenous stewardship and sovereignty.

Land Back is framed not as division, but as restoration.

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:

• Braiding Sweetgrass
• Gathering Moss, recipient of the John Burroughs Medal
• The Serviceberry
• Bud Finds Her Gift

Her work has appeared in Orion, Whole Terrain, and numerous scientific journals. In 2015, she addressed the General Assembly of the United Nations on “Healing Our Relationship with Nature.”

She is a SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor of Environmental Biology and founder and director of the Center for Native Peoples and the Environment, which draws on both Indigenous and scientific knowledge to advance shared goals of sustainability. In 2022, she was named a MacArthur Fellow.

She holds a BS in Botany from SUNY ESF and an MS and PhD in Botany from the University of Wisconsin. She lives on an old farm in upstate New York, tending gardens both cultivated and wild.

Robin also leads the Plant Baby Plant movement, encouraging grassroots ecological care and reciprocity.