WEBVTT - Indigenous Science With Jessica Hernandez 0:00:00.560 --> 0:00:03.120 We should dismantle the fact that indigenous peoples are seeing 0:00:03.120 --> 0:00:06.600 as research subjects and areas of expertise rather than the 0:00:06.680 --> 0:00:08.760 scientists and experts themselves. 0:00:12.480 --> 0:00:16.480 From futro media and PRX, It's Latino Usa, I'm Maria 0:00:16.520 --> 0:00:19.759 in No Rosa today, Jessica Hernandez and why we need 0:00:19.840 --> 0:00:32.760 Indigenous environmental science For Jessica Irnandez, becoming an environmental scientist 0:00:32.800 --> 0:00:35.720 seemed like the most natural thing in the world. She 0:00:35.800 --> 0:00:38.360 had grown up learning about animals and plants from her 0:00:38.400 --> 0:00:42.159 grandmother in Joahaka in southern Mexico. She loved going fishing 0:00:42.200 --> 0:00:45.840 with her father, where she always seemed to learn something new. 0:00:46.840 --> 0:00:49.960 Jessica felt that she already had so much to share 0:00:50.000 --> 0:00:53.120 with other people who were interested in the environment. But 0:00:53.159 --> 0:00:57.760 when she started studying marine science, things weren't so simple 0:00:57.880 --> 0:01:01.279 all of a sudden. As an indigenous immigrant woman at 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:05.080 a university in the United States, the knowledge she brought 0:01:05.080 --> 0:01:09.759 to the classroom was mocked or dismissed. Her professors had 0:01:10.120 --> 0:01:13.320 no interest in what she and, by extension, her family 0:01:13.360 --> 0:01:19.319 and her community had to say. Still, Jessica knew that 0:01:19.319 --> 0:01:22.319 she belonged any place where the environment was being discussed, 0:01:22.840 --> 0:01:25.680 not just for her love of nature, but because she 0:01:25.720 --> 0:01:28.119 had seen how being shut out of the conversation had 0:01:28.120 --> 0:01:32.800 been so harmful to her Suppotheic and Mayachorti communities. So 0:01:33.240 --> 0:01:36.560 she finished her degree, but didn't stop there. She got 0:01:36.600 --> 0:01:40.800 a master's and then a PhD in environmental and forestry sciences. 0:01:41.280 --> 0:01:45.400 She learned the formulas and specialized terms used in academia, 0:01:45.680 --> 0:01:49.320 and she confirmed what she had always known, that what 0:01:49.440 --> 0:01:53.200 her grandmother and father had taught her was also a 0:01:53.240 --> 0:01:59.920 form of science. Jessica collected her family's stories, historical accounts, 0:02:00.040 --> 0:02:03.360 and other case studies in her twenty twenty two book 0:02:03.680 --> 0:02:09.320 Fresh Banana Leaves, Healing Indigenous Landscapes through Indigenous Science, which 0:02:09.400 --> 0:02:12.560 she hopes will change how we think about environmental science. 0:02:12.880 --> 0:02:15.280 It's a message that we're happy to bring back to 0:02:15.360 --> 0:02:19.000 you today, dear listener. In her own words, here's doctor 0:02:19.240 --> 0:02:21.120 Jessica Hernandez. 0:02:21.320 --> 0:02:24.960 When the Olpaducci Bigree. My name is Jessica Hernandez, and 0:02:25.000 --> 0:02:28.960 I'm from the Maya, Chorty and Sapotech nations of Salvador 0:02:29.080 --> 0:02:34.960 and Oohaka, Mexico. I'm an indigenous environmental scientist. I currently 0:02:35.000 --> 0:02:38.120 holds a position at the University of Washington, Boto, where 0:02:38.120 --> 0:02:42.160 I teach introduction to climate science. I also conduct research 0:02:42.160 --> 0:02:46.160 on environmental physics of climate science, and I wrote a 0:02:46.160 --> 0:02:50.640 book entitled Fresh Banana Leaves, Healing Indigenous Landscapes through Indigenous Science. 0:02:52.200 --> 0:02:54.520 One of my fondest memories is just being able to 0:02:54.560 --> 0:02:59.040 go visit my grandmother in Wohaka, Mexico, and she just 0:02:59.080 --> 0:03:01.240 taught me a lot about our environments. She liked to 0:03:01.280 --> 0:03:03.560 go walking when she was able to walk, and she 0:03:03.560 --> 0:03:06.080 would just teach me about the landscape, the mongols, and 0:03:06.160 --> 0:03:11.880 also about the animals. My dad loved fishing, and because 0:03:11.880 --> 0:03:13.800 he was a fisherman, that's how he was able to 0:03:13.800 --> 0:03:16.400 sustain his family in the Salvador, because he was the 0:03:16.520 --> 0:03:19.720 eldest and he used to fish. And I think that 0:03:19.919 --> 0:03:22.280 I always thought my dad was like really smart because 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:26.440 like we went fishing, he didn't need a rod, right, 0:03:26.440 --> 0:03:28.360 Like he could make his own rod out of the 0:03:28.400 --> 0:03:32.560 materials that he could find. He could make fish nets also, 0:03:32.600 --> 0:03:34.280 and I always thought that that was really cool. And 0:03:34.320 --> 0:03:36.920 I noticed that when I was like in elementary school, 0:03:37.120 --> 0:03:39.160 my dad was learning how to read with me, and 0:03:39.200 --> 0:03:42.120 that always made me question, like, oh, my dad is learning, 0:03:42.120 --> 0:03:45.120 Like what does that mean, but my dad sharing that 0:03:45.480 --> 0:03:47.640 journey with me as I was learning how to read 0:03:47.760 --> 0:03:49.480 kind of inspire me to be like, oh, and my 0:03:49.560 --> 0:03:52.080 dad is like doing this with me, maybe I should, 0:03:52.120 --> 0:03:55.840 you know, look into school. And I think that that's 0:03:55.880 --> 0:03:59.120 what motivated me to love education, because my parents had 0:03:59.200 --> 0:04:02.200 been denied and they instilled in me like, oh, you know, 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:06.600 if you can get education, go for it. Being introduced 0:04:06.640 --> 0:04:09.440 to the environment from the lens of my grandmother and 0:04:09.480 --> 0:04:13.520 my father, it kind of fostered that interest in me 0:04:13.640 --> 0:04:20.120 to want to learn more about your environments. I always 0:04:20.200 --> 0:04:23.479 noticed how my communities and my relatives back in my 0:04:23.560 --> 0:04:26.359 ancestral lens were always dismissed, right, Like if they wanted 0:04:26.400 --> 0:04:28.919 to advocate for something in the environment, they'll be like 0:04:28.920 --> 0:04:31.800 alsos indios, no savin, Like they don't know anything. They're 0:04:32.080 --> 0:04:34.720 you know, ignorant, Like what are they talking about? And 0:04:34.800 --> 0:04:37.520 I think that that's something that my grandmother staled in 0:04:37.600 --> 0:04:39.800 me because she was like, oh, you have the opportunity 0:04:39.880 --> 0:04:44.159 to pursue education, even my parents, right, Like my dad 0:04:44.400 --> 0:04:48.240 didn't get any Western education, right because he was busy 0:04:48.400 --> 0:04:51.720 as a child trying to support his family after his 0:04:51.760 --> 0:04:55.120 father passed away, so he never stepped foot in a classroom, 0:04:56.520 --> 0:04:59.280 and I guess I will be my naiveness because I thought, 0:04:59.279 --> 0:05:01.719 you know, like oh, I bring in my family's teachings 0:05:01.760 --> 0:05:04.440 into the curriculum. I could bring it to the professors, 0:05:04.680 --> 0:05:08.400 They're gonna really accept it. But when I went into 0:05:08.440 --> 0:05:11.479 the classrooms, oftentimes, you know, I was ridiculed by professors 0:05:11.480 --> 0:05:13.200 because there will be like, oh, you need to cite this, 0:05:13.880 --> 0:05:17.240 you know, you need to go towards peer review articles, 0:05:17.640 --> 0:05:19.760 or you know, is this Jessica's theory? Where is this 0:05:19.920 --> 0:05:24.400 information coming from? When I was sharing testimonies or lift 0:05:24.440 --> 0:05:28.320 experiences that will hint towards the topic we were discussing, 0:05:28.360 --> 0:05:32.120 but because it wasn't published or it didn't have any 0:05:32.279 --> 0:05:36.680 scientific credibility, it was like dismissed and oftentimes ridiculed by 0:05:36.720 --> 0:05:39.600 my professor's right. Even as a graduate student, I had 0:05:39.600 --> 0:05:42.280 to sit in classrooms while they were laughing like I 0:05:42.320 --> 0:05:44.279 had just like set a joke or something, and I 0:05:44.320 --> 0:05:48.520 was like, okay, but that just shows you how professors, 0:05:49.160 --> 0:05:54.320 you know, especially why scientists can be dismissive towards indigenous peoples, right, 0:05:54.360 --> 0:05:57.039 And that was me, somebody who had privileged to be 0:05:57.080 --> 0:06:00.280 in that classes. So I could just imagine how they 0:06:00.279 --> 0:06:03.240 would treat our communities if they went to our communities, 0:06:03.279 --> 0:06:05.279 and they will share all these stories as well, right, 0:06:05.839 --> 0:06:06.799 they'll probably laugh. 0:06:06.680 --> 0:06:07.279 As well. 0:06:10.520 --> 0:06:14.080 To see how they were very dismissive. Kind of like 0:06:14.320 --> 0:06:17.039 made me understand that you know, what I had mbitioned 0:06:17.200 --> 0:06:20.400 environmental sciences to be as a field wasn't necessarily what 0:06:21.000 --> 0:06:23.760 it was going to be. The sciences have the lowest 0:06:24.120 --> 0:06:27.800 diverse populations of students and even professors. I don't recall 0:06:29.120 --> 0:06:33.599 indigenous professor throughout my undergraduates. So even in my graduate degree, 0:06:33.640 --> 0:06:36.480 like if I wanted to work with an indigenous professor, 0:06:36.480 --> 0:06:38.839 I had to go to the Department of American Indian 0:06:38.920 --> 0:06:41.839 Studies or the Department of Ethnic Studies. But it wasn't 0:06:41.880 --> 0:06:45.680 necessarily within the College of the Environment or the departments 0:06:45.720 --> 0:06:49.240 of the Environments. But my grandmother always told me, like, 0:06:49.279 --> 0:06:52.400 if you can learn how the colonizers, so you know, 0:06:52.480 --> 0:06:56.599 the Gringo speak, you can help us advocate for our environments. 0:06:56.640 --> 0:06:59.480 Right because now, like they're not going to dismiss our 0:06:59.520 --> 0:07:07.400 way of no, because we can use that Western terminology. Personally, 0:07:07.480 --> 0:07:10.560 I prefer to use the term indigenous science as opposed 0:07:10.560 --> 0:07:15.360 to traditional ecological knowledge, because oftentimes I think that traditional 0:07:15.400 --> 0:07:19.960 ecological knowledge has this connotation that it's knowledge that no 0:07:20.040 --> 0:07:23.480 longer exists, or that it's kind of like traditional in 0:07:23.520 --> 0:07:26.280 the sense that it belongs to a museum, as opposed 0:07:26.320 --> 0:07:31.040 to it's alive and has adapted over the years. Our 0:07:31.080 --> 0:07:34.280 knowledge systems are a form of science, if anything. They're 0:07:34.400 --> 0:07:38.440 like the longest living in science on planet Earth because 0:07:38.560 --> 0:07:43.000 it has been kind of created or passed down through generations. 0:07:44.560 --> 0:07:47.920 It has also adapted as our environments adapted. Because you know, 0:07:47.920 --> 0:07:52.400 our indigenous science that probably our great grandparents had, it's 0:07:52.440 --> 0:07:55.120 not the same that you know we have because our 0:07:55.240 --> 0:08:01.040 environments have drastically changed because of climate change, ury and 0:08:01.120 --> 0:08:05.240 everything that colonialism introduced to our lands. And I think 0:08:05.280 --> 0:08:09.840 that one of my biggest push is that indigenous peoples 0:08:09.920 --> 0:08:14.280 are scientists, and that oftentimes we are told, because we 0:08:14.360 --> 0:08:17.560 live in under this Desettler frameworks, that we have to 0:08:17.640 --> 0:08:22.440 obtain degrees for our knowledge to be validated. But you know, 0:08:22.520 --> 0:08:27.040 all of indigenous peoples who have that knowledge to steward 0:08:27.120 --> 0:08:31.520 their lands, to co manage their resources with their entire 0:08:31.600 --> 0:08:35.880 community tribes or pueblos, hold on to that science that 0:08:36.480 --> 0:08:40.360 is the foundation of our existence and resistance. They might 0:08:40.400 --> 0:08:43.920 not be peer review or published as much as you know, 0:08:44.000 --> 0:08:47.680 the Western sciences, but it holds as much credibility as 0:08:47.720 --> 0:08:52.520 the Western sciences do. I was always interested in trying 0:08:52.559 --> 0:08:56.079 to write a book that boys my father's story, especially 0:08:56.240 --> 0:08:59.840 history as a child soldier who fought in the Civil War, 0:09:00.440 --> 0:09:05.120 and I think that once I was able to get 0:09:05.160 --> 0:09:08.680 him to sit down and tell me his whole story, 0:09:08.800 --> 0:09:11.320 it kind of like spark an interest for me to 0:09:11.360 --> 0:09:15.880 write it. I wanted to be able to share his story, 0:09:15.960 --> 0:09:17.800 but I also wanted to be able to tie in 0:09:17.880 --> 0:09:21.840 the stories of my mother, my grandmother, my aunts, my relatives, 0:09:21.840 --> 0:09:25.800 my community members, and other people that I'm in community with, 0:09:26.240 --> 0:09:31.280 so that we can amplify how indigenous rights, even if 0:09:31.320 --> 0:09:35.559 we're talking about immigration rights, are all interconnected to our environment. 0:09:37.520 --> 0:09:40.560 Through the book, I weave different scenarios or case studies 0:09:40.559 --> 0:09:44.040 of communities who have led that movement, and hopefully that 0:09:44.120 --> 0:09:47.280 also shows people and the readers that you know, it 0:09:47.400 --> 0:09:51.120 is something that they can support instead of co opting 0:09:51.200 --> 0:09:53.400 or stealing. Because I also tends to happen right in 0:09:53.480 --> 0:09:55.720 the Western framework where people are like, oh, that's a 0:09:55.720 --> 0:09:57.920 great idea. Let me go steal it and name it 0:09:57.960 --> 0:10:01.199 something else and then pretend I'm the founder when it's 0:10:01.240 --> 0:10:04.560 like indigenous knowledgists that were shared to certain people and 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:08.160 then they take that ownership. One of the examples that 0:10:08.200 --> 0:10:11.680 I can give is permaculture. So permaculture is this like 0:10:11.800 --> 0:10:15.760 holistic way of doing agriculture where you're not necessarily putting 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:20.320 much labor into the agricultural system, but the agricultural system 0:10:20.360 --> 0:10:23.000 is sustaining in itself. And when you look at the 0:10:23.040 --> 0:10:26.480 history of permaculture, it was founded, you know, and I 0:10:26.559 --> 0:10:30.440 quote that founded by a white man who went to 0:10:31.200 --> 0:10:36.839 Australia and learned from some Aborigine communities, and permaculture then 0:10:36.920 --> 0:10:41.880 became this like really expensive certificate that you can get. 0:10:43.080 --> 0:10:44.880 That's one of the critiques that I make in the 0:10:44.880 --> 0:10:47.760 book on how we should dismantle the fact that Indigenous 0:10:47.760 --> 0:10:50.800 peoples are seeing as research subjects and areas of expertise 0:10:51.280 --> 0:10:55.319 rather than the scientists and experts themselves, even without degrees. 0:10:57.000 --> 0:10:59.280 There's a lot of research articles written about the Sample 0:10:59.360 --> 0:11:02.520 Tape community. But when I have asked people in my 0:11:02.600 --> 0:11:04.920 community or did you know this and that you know 0:11:04.960 --> 0:11:07.040 that was written about our community, They're like, oh, I 0:11:07.080 --> 0:11:09.439 had never heard that, So that shows you how many 0:11:09.520 --> 0:11:12.600 of the times indigenous peoples are used as the research 0:11:12.679 --> 0:11:16.800 subjects and not the research experts. I'm really careful with 0:11:16.960 --> 0:11:21.920 like not sharing any medicinal remedies or sacred knowledge because 0:11:21.960 --> 0:11:23.719 it's kind of hard, right, because you don't know who 0:11:23.760 --> 0:11:26.679 to trust. And I think that being exposed to all 0:11:26.720 --> 0:11:30.720 these stories of co optation, our knowledge theft made me 0:11:30.800 --> 0:11:33.040 a little bit more guarded on the knowledge I will share. 0:11:33.280 --> 0:11:35.920 So I feel like I always walked the fine line 0:11:35.920 --> 0:11:39.560 of sharing my Indigenous knowledge with other people because you know, 0:11:39.600 --> 0:11:42.120 it can either be copt this stolen, or it also 0:11:42.200 --> 0:11:46.439 invalidated or dismissed. What I want readers to take away 0:11:46.440 --> 0:11:49.640 from this book is to learn more about the indigenous 0:11:49.679 --> 0:11:53.600 movements that are happening across the Americas, because oftentimes we 0:11:54.000 --> 0:11:58.480 fail to recognize how our certain identities contribute to sellar 0:11:58.559 --> 0:12:02.400 colonialism back in Latin America. In the United States, we 0:12:02.480 --> 0:12:06.000 focus more on being oppressed because we are oppressed as 0:12:06.040 --> 0:12:09.200 people of color. But when we go back to Latin America, 0:12:09.440 --> 0:12:12.880 is after indigenous, black and Indigenous people who are oppressed 0:12:13.120 --> 0:12:15.480 by you know, some of us. And I think that 0:12:15.559 --> 0:12:19.199 hopefully that brings a new perspective to the whole narrative 0:12:19.280 --> 0:12:22.520 of the oppressed and the oppressor, and how we can 0:12:22.600 --> 0:12:28.280 work together to undo that. One of the things that 0:12:28.320 --> 0:12:31.520 I talk about in the book is that conservation is 0:12:31.640 --> 0:12:35.640 a Western construct because in our languages, like if I 0:12:35.679 --> 0:12:39.080 were to try to translate conservation to the Sybotech language 0:12:39.120 --> 0:12:43.360 or the Miotority language or other languages that many Indigenous 0:12:43.360 --> 0:12:47.560 people speak, there is no word that directly translates to conservation. 0:12:47.760 --> 0:12:51.319 Most of the words that kind of tie or are 0:12:51.320 --> 0:12:57.679 interconnected to conservation focus more on protection, like protecting our environment. 0:12:58.280 --> 0:13:01.120 Most of the words in our languages hint towards healing 0:13:01.920 --> 0:13:05.960 rather than you like conserving. Is not only that it 0:13:05.960 --> 0:13:09.160 cannot be directly translated to our languages, but sometimes it 0:13:09.200 --> 0:13:13.760 comes in conflict where a way of life and oftentimes 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:17.920 in the name of conservation. There is this oppression used 0:13:18.000 --> 0:13:22.440 against indigenous peoples, especially when it comes to their inherited 0:13:22.520 --> 0:13:26.640 rights to have access to certain natural resources, and we 0:13:26.720 --> 0:13:30.320 see that in national parks. When national parks were created, 0:13:30.679 --> 0:13:35.079 it was under this framework to conserve the natural, pristine wilderness, 0:13:35.520 --> 0:13:38.319 when in reality there was a lot of indigenous communities 0:13:38.320 --> 0:13:42.280 who lived in those lands that are now national parks 0:13:42.320 --> 0:13:47.040 that were exploited, oppressed, and kind of removed from their 0:13:47.040 --> 0:13:49.960 ancestral lands. And I think that it kind of shows 0:13:50.000 --> 0:13:53.559 the nuances that need to be discussed in the national 0:13:53.600 --> 0:13:56.480 park system because a lot of these monuments have names 0:13:56.520 --> 0:14:00.559 of violent people that perpetated that violence against Indigenous communities 0:14:00.600 --> 0:14:04.480 that were violently ripped off or remove from their lands. 0:14:07.760 --> 0:14:10.840 So the project that I conducted for my dissertation was 0:14:10.840 --> 0:14:15.280 to indigenize restoration in Discovery Park, located in Seattle, Washington, 0:14:15.400 --> 0:14:18.360 is the largest urban park in the state of Washington, 0:14:18.840 --> 0:14:22.240 and that's an interesting park because it has a really 0:14:22.280 --> 0:14:25.680 beautiful Indigenous history behind it. I decided to use my 0:14:25.760 --> 0:14:29.280 PhD to try to restore and heal some of those 0:14:29.280 --> 0:14:33.080 twenty acres of land. But in that way, what I 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:37.440 decided to do was to amplify and center the Indigenous 0:14:37.480 --> 0:14:41.440 ways of healing our earth. And one of the teachings 0:14:41.440 --> 0:14:46.120 that our elders were able to teach us to practice 0:14:46.160 --> 0:14:50.840 was that under Western conservation, in basis species, they're like 0:14:51.120 --> 0:14:55.760 known as pests or weeds, but for Indigenous communities, we 0:14:55.800 --> 0:14:59.640 should see them as displaced relatives because there are someone's 0:14:59.680 --> 0:15:03.160 relative tists that have been displaced, like many of us have. 0:15:04.280 --> 0:15:07.160 I gotten a lot of fights with the Seattle Parks 0:15:07.160 --> 0:15:10.360 and Recreation Department because you know, even the way that 0:15:10.760 --> 0:15:13.120 they wanted us to take care of the weeds was 0:15:13.160 --> 0:15:15.200 different than the way we were told to take care 0:15:15.240 --> 0:15:17.920 of the weeds by our elders, because you know, for them, 0:15:17.960 --> 0:15:20.320 it's like their weeds they just have to be removed 0:15:20.440 --> 0:15:22.600 versus you know us. We will do prayers and we 0:15:22.640 --> 0:15:25.640 will ask for their permission to leave, you know, the 0:15:25.720 --> 0:15:29.000 land so that native species can come back in. So 0:15:29.080 --> 0:15:30.600 it was a lot of like I wouldn't say, like 0:15:30.800 --> 0:15:33.080 really bad conflict, but a lot of like fights with 0:15:33.520 --> 0:15:37.800 Seattle Parks because of the way that we practice restoration 0:15:38.000 --> 0:15:43.280 wasn't aligned to their rule book. One of the interesting 0:15:43.360 --> 0:15:46.280 metaphors that I use in the book is that banana 0:15:46.320 --> 0:15:50.160 trees are invasive to Central America, yet we have embraced 0:15:50.200 --> 0:15:53.400 them our relatives, right. And I think that that's a 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:56.360 metaphor that I use for my lift experiences and the 0:15:56.400 --> 0:16:01.080 lift experiences of many displaced indigenous peoples that as banana trees, 0:16:01.440 --> 0:16:04.800 we have also been displaced from our ancestral lands, yet 0:16:05.200 --> 0:16:08.320 we adapt to our environments, and in this case, you know, 0:16:08.920 --> 0:16:12.040 sometimes we're welcome into those environments. Like in the case 0:16:12.040 --> 0:16:15.000 of banana trees, like you know in Central America, they 0:16:15.000 --> 0:16:17.520 have been used in our traditional foods to make our 0:16:17.600 --> 0:16:21.640 tamalis platanos. We you know, we fry them. Yet they're 0:16:21.680 --> 0:16:25.360 displaced relatives, right, They're not native species. They come from 0:16:25.360 --> 0:16:29.120 Southeast Asia, but they were introduced. And I think, like 0:16:29.240 --> 0:16:33.440 banana trees, displaced indigenous peoples, we're forced to adapt to 0:16:33.560 --> 0:16:37.200 our new environments and hopefully, you know, for some of us, 0:16:37.240 --> 0:16:42.000 we're working to become welcome into those new environments. One 0:16:42.040 --> 0:16:44.440 of the teachers on my grandma always told me was 0:16:44.520 --> 0:16:47.840 that anywhere I walked that wasn't my lands, I wasn't 0:16:47.880 --> 0:16:50.400 a welcome guest, right, because it was like, we're going 0:16:50.400 --> 0:16:53.200 into other people's homes, and those other people are the 0:16:53.240 --> 0:16:57.040 indigenous peoples whose lands were walking on. And I think 0:16:57.080 --> 0:16:59.400 that one of the things she always told me to 0:16:59.560 --> 0:17:02.600 think of about was how do you become a welcome guest, right? 0:17:02.640 --> 0:17:05.640 Because I have to still navigate that as a displaced 0:17:05.640 --> 0:17:08.240 indigenous woman, and the same way that I want people 0:17:08.280 --> 0:17:15.280 to form those relationships with my communities once they're in Wahaka. 0:17:15.440 --> 0:17:19.040 One of the beauties of being an Indigenous instructor, especially 0:17:19.040 --> 0:17:21.640 in the college setting, is that I can support other 0:17:21.680 --> 0:17:25.240 Indigenous students. I want to inspire students to find that 0:17:25.320 --> 0:17:28.439 sense of belonging, because like I always crave to have 0:17:28.480 --> 0:17:32.960 an indigenous professor teaching me about the environmental sciences, but 0:17:33.160 --> 0:17:36.080 I never got that. In a way, sometimes I question, like, oh, 0:17:36.119 --> 0:17:38.159 do I really want to become a professor? Go for 0:17:38.240 --> 0:17:41.040 ten years? But then I think about my younger self, 0:17:41.160 --> 0:17:43.920 and I think about that eighteen year old who crave 0:17:44.040 --> 0:17:47.959 that indigenous professor that she could approach after class and 0:17:48.080 --> 0:17:51.119 talk to them, right, And I think that being an 0:17:51.160 --> 0:17:55.119 Indigenous instructor now kind of allows me to cater to 0:17:55.160 --> 0:17:55.840 those students. 0:18:26.160 --> 0:18:29.520 This episode was produced by Victoria Strada. It was edited 0:18:29.520 --> 0:18:33.680 by Andrea Lopez Cruzado. It was mixed by Gabriel Labiez. 0:18:33.920 --> 0:18:38.320 The Latino USA team includes Julia Caruso, Jessica Ellis, Dominique 0:18:38.480 --> 0:18:44.000 Estrosa Rinaldo Leanos Junior, Stephanie Lebo, Luis Luna Marta Martinez, 0:18:44.040 --> 0:18:48.960 Norsaudi and Nancy Trujillo, Penille Ramirez, Marlon Bishop, Maria Garcia 0:18:49.000 --> 0:18:52.080 and myself are your co executive producers and I'm your host, 0:18:52.080 --> 0:18:55.320 Mariao Morosa. You can find us on your podcast feed 0:18:55.320 --> 0:18:59.440 at Latino Usa. Also on our website Latino Usa dot org. 0:18:59.840 --> 0:19:03.080 We have extended versions of our stories dropping every Friday 0:19:03.119 --> 0:19:06.439 and Sunday. Join us again on our next episode. Dear listener, 0:19:06.440 --> 0:19:09.359 in the meantime, I'll see you on social media. Estell approxima. 0:19:10.080 --> 0:19:19.200 Yes, Latino USA is made possible in part by California Endowment, 0:19:19.520 --> 0:19:22.840 building a strong state by improving the health of all Californians, 0:19:23.640 --> 0:19:27.919 The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation for more than fifty 0:19:28.000 --> 0:19:33.800 years advancing ideas and supporting institutions to promote a better 0:19:33.840 --> 0:19:39.240 world at Hewlett dot org, and funding for Latino USA 0:19:39.359 --> 0:19:42.360 is Coverage of a culture of health is made possible 0:19:42.400 --> 0:19:50.200 in part by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Okay, yeah, 0:19:50.200 --> 0:19:50.879 I know that. 0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:55.840 Okay. So the title of the book is Fresh Banana 0:19:55.880 --> 0:19:59.040 Leafs Healing Indigenous Landscapes through Indigenous Science.