Five Key Takeaways from the SoE/SEB Conference

“A what conference?”

That was the standard reply I got when I excitedly told people that I was heading to Atlanta for an ethnobiology conference. More specifically, the joint meeting of the Society of Ethnobiology and the newly renamed Society for Ethnobotany.

Though similar-sounding terms, ethnobiology and ethnobotany describe two different but complementary areas of study: Ethnobiology is the study of relationships between people, biota (including animals) and environments, while ethnobotany hones in on people-plant relationships.

Held at Emory University, the conference focused on the inextricable linkages between human and planetary health.

Here are the five key messages I took away from the incredible line-up of key-note speakers, panelists and presenters:

1 | “Jam is for preserving, culture is for living.”

Delivered during the open plenary of the conference by Dr. Lindsay Borrows, this quote really struck a chord for me.

When I think about the difference between culture and heritage, I like to think about water and vessels. Water can take the shape of whatever vessel we keep it in. Whether we put it in glass or earthenware, a tall vase or small cup, the water itself remains the same. Heritage is the vessel, the output of dynamic, experiential, communal, and adaptive cultural processes. I find that many things we describe as our ‘culture’ in the Cayman Islands are actually better described as ‘heritage’. Take eating turtle as an example. Is eating turtle our culture? Or is that merely the vessel which contains generations’ worth of repeated encounters with these incredible animals?

There was a time when the “Cayman turtle men” knew more about turtles than anyone else in the world. Renowned herpetologist Archie Carr wrote: “To understand the confidence of the Caymanians in their turtle lore, you must realise how intimately they have lived with the beasts and how closely they study their ways and wiles on the fishing banks.”

How does our understanding of our cultural relationship with turtles change if we look at it from the perspective of knowing turtles rather than merely consuming them? If we focused on rebuilding those relationships between our people and our turtles, what new vessels would we create to contain those multitudes?

2 | Covenants of reciprocity ensure mutual flourishing.

Covenants of reciprocity are a key concept throughout the writings of Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of Braiding Sweetgrass and one of the conference’s key note speakers.

Reciprocity is about recognising the gifts we receive every day from the Earth, and being empowered by our responsibility to actively practice gratitude.

Gratitude as a practice, she writes, is “much more than a simple thank you”. When we are grateful to the living world “[W]e cannot be bystanders to its destruction. Attention becomes intention, which coalesces itself to action.” By recognising our relationship with the world, we understand that the destruction of the planet is the destruction of the life-giving processes that sustain us. In this context, mutual flourishing relies on “a change in heart, a change in ethics, away from an anthropocentric worldview that considers the Earth our exploitable property to a biocentric, life-centered worldview in which an ethic of respect and reciprocity can grow.”

How can we explore gratitude as a practice that endows us with the incredible gift of responsibility towards the living world?

3 | The future is indigenous.

This was the slogan of Sean Sherman, the Oglala Lakota chef and founder of The Sioux Chef when he gave a keynote speech during the conference.

To me, this means that a sustainable future relies on a collective shift towards ways of knowing the living world that are consistent with the values of indigenous cultures.

In the context of the Cayman Islands, we do not need to look too far back in our history to find a time when the survival of our people was intimately connected with knowledge of the plants and animals of our land and sea. The importance of this hard-won wisdom has not lessened, it has merely changed.

How can we redefine the increasingly eroded connections between our people and our environment so we can responsibly practice our place within the living world?

4 | Plant knowledge is power.

I like to think that you could drop me in the middle of the bush and I would know the names of the plants around me, which ones could harm me, which ones could heal me, clothe me, feed me, and shelter me. To me, that is an incredibly empowering thought – that I know my islands the way my ancestors did, and could survive and thrive the way they did.

But the power that comes with plant knowledge goes beyond mere self-preservation, it is also the power to protect those species, to fight for their existence, to recognise their inherent worth.

When we know the names of the species around us – and not just the scientific names but also the common names that intertwine those biota with our unique Caymanian culture – we can harness the power in those connections for the benefit of all.

5 | Everything is connected.

To paraphrase a line from Avatar: The Last Airbender (Yes, you read that right. It’s an incredible series that holds lessons for viewers of all ages.) – the greatest illusion of this world is that of separation.

Everything is connected.

There are no qualifiers to this statement. It is a truth increasingly recognised in the scientific world at the same time it is stubbornly dismissed by our political and economic systems. We are a part of this world, not apart from it.

How can we shape our systems to reflect this fact rather than strain against it? And what can we gain by doing so?