Winona LaDuke

Seeds of Life, Not Genetically Modified Organisms

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It’s TED talk Tuesday on 350orbust. Here’s Winona LaDuke, whom I had the good fortune to meet recently, speaking about our broken food system from a First Nations perspective:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHNlel72eQc]

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Winona is an internationally renowned activist working on issues of sustainable development, renewable energy and food systems. She lives and works on the White Earth reservation in northern Minnesota. As Program Director of Honor the Earth, she works nationally and internationally on the issues of climate change, renewable energy, and environmental justice with Indigenous communities. In her own community, she is the founder of the White Earth Land Recovery Project, where she works to protect Indigenous plants and heritage foods from patenting and genetic engineering. A graduate of Harvard and Antioch Universities, LaDuke has written extensively on Native American and environmental issues. She is the author of five books, including Recovering the Sacred, All our Relations and a novel, Last Standing Woman.

Really Cool Old Squash and Writing Festivals

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I still haven’t had a chance to catch my breath since returning home from our trip to Newfoundland last week, having jumped with both feet into the Turtle Island Writing Festival the afternoon of our arrival, including hosting one of the distinguished authors. Today I once again hit the road, this time to deliver our eldest daughter to Winnipeg where she is catching a flight to Europe, to spend much of the next two months walking the Camino de Santiago trail in Spain.

Here’s a glimpse of the Turtle Island Writing Festival, where Anishinaabe author and activist Winona LaDuke presented, as well as Calgary journalist, editor, and author of “All Our Sisters: Stories of Homeless Women in Canada” Susan Scott. Local author Kathy Tetlock and arts educator Lila Cano also shared insights and spurred our creativity. This is my favourite picture, of me handing Winona LaDuke the “really cool old squash” she brought up to share with us. The squash is grown from 800 year old seeds found at an archeological dig in Minnesota several years ago, inside a clay ball.

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Gotta run!