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Black Earth Wisdom: Soulful Conversations with Black Environmentalists
A soulful collection of illuminating essays and interviews that explore Black people’s spiritual and scientific connection to the land, waters, and climate, curated by the acclaimed author of Farming While Black.
Author of Farming While Black and co-founder of Soul Fire Farm, Leah Penniman reminds us that ecological humility is an intrinsic part of Black cultural heritage. While racial capitalism has attempted to sever our connection to the sacred earth for 400 years, Black people have long seen the land and water as family and understood the intrinsic value of nature. This thought-provoking anthology brings together today’s most respected and influential Black environmentalist voices —leaders who have cultivated the skill of listening to the Earth —to share the lessons they have learned.
These varied and distinguished experts include Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award-winning author Alice Walker; the first Queen Mother and official spokesperson for the Gullah/Geechee Nation, Queen Quet; marine biologist, policy expert, and founder and president of Ocean Collectiv, Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson; and the Executive Director of the North Carolina Association of Black Lawyers, Land Loss Prevention Project, Savi Horne. In Black Earth Wisdom, they address the essential connection between nature and our survival and how runaway consumption and corporate insatiability are harming the earth and every facet of American society, engendering racial violence, food apartheid, and climate injustice. Those whose skin is the color of soil are reviving their ancestral and ancient practice of listening to the earth for guidance. Penniman makes clear that the fight for racial and environmental justice demands that people put our planet first and defer to nature as our ultimate teacher.
Contributors include: Alice Walker • adrienne maree brown • Dr. Ross Gay • Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson • Rue Mapp • Dr. Carolyn Finney • Audrey Peterman • Awise Agbaye Wande Abimbola • Ibrahim Abdul-Matin • Kendra Pierre-Louis • Latria Graham • Dr. Lauret Savoy •Ira Wallace • Savi Horne • Dr. Claudia Ford • Dr. J. Drew Lanham • Dr. Leni Sorensen • Queen Quet • Toshi Reagon • Yeye Luisah Teish • Yonnette Fleming • Naima Penniman • Angelou Ezeilo • James Edward Mills • Teresa Baker • Pandora Thomas • Toi Scott • Aleya Fraser • Chris Bolden-Newsome • Dr. Joshua Bennett • B. Anderson • Chris Hill • Greg Watson • T. Morgan Dixon • Dr. Dorceta Taylor • Colette Pichon Battle • Dillon Bernard • Sharon Lavigne • Steve Curwood • and Babalawo Enroue Halfkenny
Author of Farming While Black and co-founder of Soul Fire Farm, Leah Penniman reminds us that ecological humility is an intrinsic part of Black cultural heritage. While racial capitalism has attempted to sever our connection to the sacred earth for 400 years, Black people have long seen the land and water as family and understood the intrinsic value of nature. This thought-provoking anthology brings together today’s most respected and influential Black environmentalist voices —leaders who have cultivated the skill of listening to the Earth —to share the lessons they have learned.
These varied and distinguished experts include Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award-winning author Alice Walker; the first Queen Mother and official spokesperson for the Gullah/Geechee Nation, Queen Quet; marine biologist, policy expert, and founder and president of Ocean Collectiv, Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson; and the Executive Director of the North Carolina Association of Black Lawyers, Land Loss Prevention Project, Savi Horne. In Black Earth Wisdom, they address the essential connection between nature and our survival and how runaway consumption and corporate insatiability are harming the earth and every facet of American society, engendering racial violence, food apartheid, and climate injustice. Those whose skin is the color of soil are reviving their ancestral and ancient practice of listening to the earth for guidance. Penniman makes clear that the fight for racial and environmental justice demands that people put our planet first and defer to nature as our ultimate teacher.
Contributors include: Alice Walker • adrienne maree brown • Dr. Ross Gay • Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson • Rue Mapp • Dr. Carolyn Finney • Audrey Peterman • Awise Agbaye Wande Abimbola • Ibrahim Abdul-Matin • Kendra Pierre-Louis • Latria Graham • Dr. Lauret Savoy •Ira Wallace • Savi Horne • Dr. Claudia Ford • Dr. J. Drew Lanham • Dr. Leni Sorensen • Queen Quet • Toshi Reagon • Yeye Luisah Teish • Yonnette Fleming • Naima Penniman • Angelou Ezeilo • James Edward Mills • Teresa Baker • Pandora Thomas • Toi Scott • Aleya Fraser • Chris Bolden-Newsome • Dr. Joshua Bennett • B. Anderson • Chris Hill • Greg Watson • T. Morgan Dixon • Dr. Dorceta Taylor • Colette Pichon Battle • Dillon Bernard • Sharon Lavigne • Steve Curwood • and Babalawo Enroue Halfkenny
352 pages, Hardcover
First published February 28, 2023
74 people are currently reading
2692 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 48 reviews
September 4, 2023
Very interesting and fact filled book that spoke to black history, black farmers and black environmentalists about the state of the environment and agriculture. It talked about the connections of African Americans to the earth and the danger of the knowledge we are losing because there are few black farmers, scientists etc. This was a book of interviews interspaced with background history. The effect has a bit spiritual/folklore-ish feel, as well as empirical. I found parts better than the whole. One thing that stood out for me was the discussion of lost art of cutivating seeds for planting and how big Ag has 87% of the seed market. Could be a mood thing. I may have to reread in a better state of mind, however, it was a great collection of experts and I learned quite a bit.
3.5+ Stars rounded up
Read on kindle
3.5+ Stars rounded up
Read on kindle
March 17, 2023
Black Earth Wisdom is a collection of conversations by Leah Penniman, a Black Kreyol farmer and co-director of Soul Fire Farm, with Black environmentalists. In order to create Black Earth Wisdom, Penniman interviewed a range of people and then compiled those interviews into "conversations" on specific topics. I really enjoyed the content of this book and learned a lot from the wisdom it contained. I think that, for whatever reason, interview-style books are harder for me to get into than other forms of nonfiction. I had the same challenge with Ezra Woodger's To Be a Trans Man. This was a fantastic book whose format didn't quite work for me - I think I may need to steer away from interview/conversation formatted nonfiction moving forward.
Thanks so much to Leah Penniman and Amistad for this ARC through NetGalley! Black Earth Wisdom is available as of February 28th, 2023.
Thanks so much to Leah Penniman and Amistad for this ARC through NetGalley! Black Earth Wisdom is available as of February 28th, 2023.
Currently reading
March 1, 2023Happy publication day to a highly anticipated collaborative project envisioned by co-founder of Soul Fire Farm, Leah Penniman! This is a conversation via interviews with Black environmentalists such as Dr. J. Drew Lanham, Angelou Ezeilo, and Dr. Lauret Savoy and an homage to ecological trailblazers like Dr. George Washington Carver, Audrey Peterman, and Alice Walker.
November 21, 2022
There is so much knowledge in this one book. Highly recommend!
"It is hard for Western humans to relinquish the idea that they are in charge of everything. They want to go where they please and do what they want. They want to subdue all the Indigenous people and shift from one place to another. The broken world we are living in is sustained by brute force."
"It is hard for Western humans to relinquish the idea that they are in charge of everything. They want to go where they please and do what they want. They want to subdue all the Indigenous people and shift from one place to another. The broken world we are living in is sustained by brute force."
May 22, 2023
A huge resource with interviews on wide-ranging topics, like the trauma that is often associated with land but also the kinship with all living beings and the knowledge of how to forage and thrive. Also, Penniman acknowledges: “As Black climate activist Andrea Manning states, ‘If you’re not affected by climate change today, that itself is a privilege.’”
May 14, 2023
Full of wise words to follow. I loved the poem at the end, a good reminder of what we come from
April 4, 2023
We needed this book so much. We're fortunate to have authors like Leah Penniman to collect all these beautiful Black experts together for us. The presentation of the dialogue is enjoyable, and there were handy introductions before each speaker. It was inspiring to hear from my people about this, in our voices, on tackling the biggest challenge of our time. Tell it like it is, call out the purposeful, systematic blocks and even sabotages to resolving past and current environmental issues! Mother Nature says we trippin', and it's true.
The scope of this book was more than I ever expected. Amazing that it took us from the farm to the city to the ocean, and every crack and crevice in between. The fact that the ocean is more the lungs of the planet than the forests was the biggest eye-opener here for me. So much we gotta do for our water, so much more attention which has to be paid.
And hell yeah, of course we bringing it all back to the arts, because only artists can shift social consciousness in the ways necessary to galvanize the people. This sentiment was so beautifully communicated in the chapter with Alice Walker, and expressed poetically later on.
Thank you Penniman for this very timely, very necessary collection.
Ebook provided by NetGalley in exchange for my honest feedback. This is it!
The scope of this book was more than I ever expected. Amazing that it took us from the farm to the city to the ocean, and every crack and crevice in between. The fact that the ocean is more the lungs of the planet than the forests was the biggest eye-opener here for me. So much we gotta do for our water, so much more attention which has to be paid.
And hell yeah, of course we bringing it all back to the arts, because only artists can shift social consciousness in the ways necessary to galvanize the people. This sentiment was so beautifully communicated in the chapter with Alice Walker, and expressed poetically later on.
Thank you Penniman for this very timely, very necessary collection.
Ebook provided by NetGalley in exchange for my honest feedback. This is it!
June 26, 2024
Wow.
I’ve been mad at myself for putting off reading this book for so long, but honestly, I picked it up at the perfect time. I’ve recently been focused on fostering more of a connection to Earth and this was perfect to read while on this journey.
This is one of the most fascinating books I’ve ever read. It’s very enlightening to hear other’s views on their relationship to the earth and how similar they are to my own as well as how they differ from my own. I love learning about so many Black people who are working to heal the earth. I have fallen in love with every contributor🥰 And I always love nonfiction that is told in transcribed interviews, but I love that the editor gets to have a distinct voice as well through the introductions to each section. You can tell so much thought, care, and intention was put into this book. From the selection of contributors, to the introductions to each section, to the interview questions. Everything was written with intention.
This book feels like a hug. I’m not sure how to explain it, because the book isn’t cozy or anything, but it’s exactly what I needed in this moment. I feel so full after finishing this. This is one of my favorite books I’ve read all year and one of my fave books of all time! I feel like every Black person should read this book, as well as every ally, and I plan on throwing this book at everyone I know till they read it! (I will literally throw it at your head to get you to read it. So, let’s do this the easy way and have you add it to your TBR of your own volition k?)
Thank you Amistad & NetGalley for this ARC. All opinions are my own.
I’ve been mad at myself for putting off reading this book for so long, but honestly, I picked it up at the perfect time. I’ve recently been focused on fostering more of a connection to Earth and this was perfect to read while on this journey.
This is one of the most fascinating books I’ve ever read. It’s very enlightening to hear other’s views on their relationship to the earth and how similar they are to my own as well as how they differ from my own. I love learning about so many Black people who are working to heal the earth. I have fallen in love with every contributor🥰 And I always love nonfiction that is told in transcribed interviews, but I love that the editor gets to have a distinct voice as well through the introductions to each section. You can tell so much thought, care, and intention was put into this book. From the selection of contributors, to the introductions to each section, to the interview questions. Everything was written with intention.
This book feels like a hug. I’m not sure how to explain it, because the book isn’t cozy or anything, but it’s exactly what I needed in this moment. I feel so full after finishing this. This is one of my favorite books I’ve read all year and one of my fave books of all time! I feel like every Black person should read this book, as well as every ally, and I plan on throwing this book at everyone I know till they read it! (I will literally throw it at your head to get you to read it. So, let’s do this the easy way and have you add it to your TBR of your own volition k?)
Thank you Amistad & NetGalley for this ARC. All opinions are my own.
March 4, 2024
Some great nuggets of wisdom here — the format of the book (transcribed interviews organized by theme) was not my favorite (and was not helped by listening to this on audio), but as an informational text and inspiration this was worth the read!
January 20, 2026
This felt very much like an environmental studies degree refresher. I particularly loved how Leah called in Black writers who have not historically been included in the genre of climate/environmental writing.
October 3, 2024
Yassssss, this book is amazing and perspective-changing.
June 27, 2024
So much beauty, love, poetry, and wisdom is jam-packed in this book. “Mama Nature asked me, “Can you hear me? And are you listening?”” 😭
August 7, 2023
Damn. So many excerpts. Let's get to it...
Great Dismal Swamp Maroons. For ten generations, they operated an anticapitalist system of communal labor. Native Americans, Africans, and African Americans fleeing the colonial frontier and enslavement.
George Washington Carver believed that deficiency in nitrogen can be made up almost wholly by keeping the legumes growing on the soil as much as possible.
Unkindness to anything means an injustice to that thing...the above principles apply with equal force to soil.
He [W. E. B. Du Bois] admonished white people for appreciating an illusion of pristine nature, an imaginary picturesque postcard, while ignoring human suffering and oppression. White people could not bring themselves to see that the suffering of racialized people marred the landscape, so they distorted their vision, avoided reality, and clung to an environmental mirage.
He [Booker T. Whatley] suggested that farmers send out a newsletter to their subscribers to update them on picking dates and farming activities so that they would 'feel as if the farm was their own'.
The Black veganism movement is growing, and today Black people are three times more likely to be vegan than the general population.
In Yoruba religion, nature is regarded as a divinity, and all plants, animals, and landforms have intrinsic value as Sacred Forces of Nature.
It is not true what the Christian bible says about nature being there just for humans to use and dominate. The way of so-called civilization is the way of destruction.
Recent studies show that Christians are less likely to be concerned about the environment than non-Christians. In the UK, Muslims are less likely to be concerned about climate change than the general population due to a faith in the afterlife and divine intervention. Taken together, Abrahamic monotheism is practiced by over half of the world's human population, so it is imperative to address the apparent incongruity between creed and earth wisdom.
It was fascinating to uncover a recent study concluding that, while people of Abrahamic faiths may be less environmentally concerned overall, Black and Hispanic Christians are more concerned about climate change than both white Christians and secular people. Black and Hispanic clergy are also more likely than white clergy to talk about climate change with their congregations.
Dr. George Washington Carver was a devout Christian and believed that nature was God's broadcasting system.
Before we jump into action plans for emissions reductions or other practical measures, we need to focus on amplifying the respect and reverence at the foundation of the relationship. (Angelou Ezeilo)
In 1914, Black families owned 14% of the nation's farms. White supremacist backlash against expanding Black land ownership was swift and severe. More than 4,000 African Americans were lynched between 1877 and 1950. Black landowners were specifically targeted for not 'staying in their place.' White people violently stole at least 24,000 acres of land from 406 Black people, depriving the Black farmers of tens of millions of dollars and often their lives. For example, Kentucky farmer David Walker and his family of seven were attacked by the KKK on October 4, 1908. KKK members burned their house to the ground with one child trapped inside, shot and killed his wife and baby, and wounded the other children. The survivors were run out of town and the 2.5-acre farm was folded into the property of their white neighbor, whose family retains title to the present day.
What happens to earth happens to me. I look at myself as an extension of everything living. (Latria Graham)
Three central ethics of permaculture are earth care, people care, and fair share.
Urban farming in Cuba grew out of necessity after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the US embargo, which curtailed oil supplies. The average Cuban lost 15 to 20 pounds in that time period, and some were near starvation. They had to figure out how to grow food w/o chemical fertilizers and pesticides.
The root of the cotton plant stimulates uterine contractions and was used as an abortifacient. Enslaved women were often forced to submit sexually to planters, owners, and enslaved and free African men in order to increase the enslaved population. 'Even as enslaved women bloodied their hands picking the masters' bolls, they used the roots of the plant to thwart unwanted conception.' (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
When you know that you are related to a being, your neurons fire differently. The love for someone you call your grandmother, brother, sister, of child engages your whole being, including your nervous system, into a compassionate and generous mode. So, if we have a kincentric point of view, then we extend our capacity for compassion out to all living things. (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
The earth is not a place of suffering, and only becomes so when we live in conflict with the earth and each other. (Chris Bolden-Newsome)
Humans would be unable to digest food without the millions of microbes living in each of our guts.
90% of flowering plants have hermaphroditic bisexual flowers that contain both male and female reproductive organs.
Cassava is also an early alarm of imbalance in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Cassava contains toxins that produce cyanide, which have to be boiled or soaked away so the eater is not poisoned and does not end up with paralysis/neurologic disorders. A full week of soaking in water renders cassava tubers safe to eat. In times of climatic and political balance, farmers are able to grow the least toxic varieties of cassava and have ample time to process out the toxins. In times of war and migration, people are moving fast and have less time to process. (Toi Scott)
Whatever we do to our bodies, we do to the earth. Whatever we do to the earth, we do to our bodies. (Toi Scott)
We are addicted to our extractive practices, which assume access to unlimited resources from a limited earth. (Adrienne Maree Brown)
I never get a microaggression from a tree. (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
There is a deep spiritual poverty in the U.S. (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
The plant world takes sunlight and gives the planet everything it needs, which is the ultimate generosity. (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
There is a specialness to the human condition, but it is not superiority. To recognize this truth with humility will fundamentally change how we interact with each other. (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
After the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, Monsanto arrived with a donation of 60,000 sacks of hybrid and GMO seeds. The Peasant Movement of Papaye, a group of Haitian farmers and a member organization of the international Indigenous led La Via Campesina, pledged to burn the seeds at the port. The called Monsanto's presence "a very strong attack on small agriculture, on farmers, on biodiversity, on Creole seeds...and on what is left of our environment in Haiti...Fighting hybrid and GMO seeds is critical to save our diversity and our agriculture."
Biodiversity is the food system's life insurance. (LP)
We have to remember that eating dark, leafy green vegetables is something that Black people gave to Europeans, not the other way around. (Ira Wallace)
Black three sisters = sorghum, pumpkin, pigeon pea. (Aleya Fraser)
Our version of three mo' sisters is sorghum intercropped with sweet potato and field peas.
Cheap food is not cheap. The cost is borne by other people and the earth. (Ira Wallace)
We need to slow down, connect, and get in tune with the rhythm of the earth if we want to increase our chances of survival. (Aleya Fraser)
The same patriarchal power structure that oppresses and exploits girls, women, and nonbinary people (and constricts and contorts boys and men) also wreaks destruction on the natural world. Dominance, supremacy, violence, extraction, egotism, greed, ruthless competition - these hallmarks of patriarchy fuel the climate crisis just as surely as they do inequality, colluding with racism along the way.
If you have come here to help me, you are wasting your time, but if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together. (Lilla Watson)
We must reframe our understanding of the problem. Climate change is not the problem; climate change is the most horrible symptom of an economic system that has been built for a privileged few to extract every precious resource out of this planet and its people - from our natural resources to the fruits of our human labor. (Colette Pichon Battle)
You must take care of the root to heal the tree. (Queen Quet)
The earth wants us to have the courage to admit we have taken too much, and to recognize that the entire world is paying the price for the privilege and comfort of just a few people on the planet. Humans have taken enough. There are some things that simply to not belong to us, and that we don't get to take, even though they exist and we have the means to take them. It's time to understand value beyond capital. (Colette Pichon Battle)
The white global north discounts people of color, and the white global north also discounts the environment. The natural environment is treated like property in the way many of my ancestors were treated like property. Both the earth and people of color are treated as discardable. (Steve Curwood)
We are human society on the edge of either environmental collapse or social evolution - and how and what we consume is a critical piece of that picture. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
In researching Green Washed, I landed on one simple truth: purchasing green can be good, but buying less is better. This simple truism is key to unlocking the door to our future sustainability. For example, researchers at the Aalto University in Finland showed that an individual's climate impact via CO2 emissions is determined by how many goods they consume. Whether we're talking about energy, clothes, food, or shelter, the sheer volume and pace of our consumption is the root problem. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
Even though societal consumption is clearly the root cause of our climate woes, we don't act because of one unsettling truth. If we were to reduce our consumption to a level that was ecologically sustainable, our entire global economic system would collapse. This isn't hyperbole. Our economic system is based on the need for perpetual growth we either grow our economy or it dies. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
Our economic system does not recognize that Earth is a finite planet with limited resources, nor that perpetual economic growth is not possible. as a whole, Earth is a closed system. Almost all of the resources at our disposal are located within the planet. Our only external input is energy from the sun in the form of solar radiation. A society built to depend heavily on nonrenewable resources is a society built on quicksand. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
Until we rethink our entire economic system and replace GDP as our measurement of success, we will not be able to act in accordance with these natural limits. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
While the Earth will adapt to life w/o humans, we cannot live w/o her. Affluent, capitalistic, white men dominate the conversations about moving to another planet. Their proposal comes from a place of not believing in limits and their deep discomfort with the idea that the planet can control them. Just as adolescents rage against their parents, not wanting to live by their rules and threatening to leave, the juvenile impulse is to escape the limits of the planet. We can't run away from limit. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
I am a real lover of the spirit of Jesus. He was a revolutionary and he pledged allegiance to the earth. At the same time, the Bible has many parts that are destructive to us and that have taught us shame about our very being. Being Black in the Bible is always negative. The tradition of enslavement is preached and practiced in the Bible. (Alice Walker)
Artists and poetry are essential because they connect us to what we cannot see. They open our eyes to what we are blind to, and help us feel the Mother speaking. (Alice Walker)
Y'all trippin'. The earth would also say the impulse is there to live in harmony with all life, because there clearly are communities all across the planet that live in more robust communion with the planet. We have to honor those realities as actual. I worry that when we talk discursively about ecological catastrophe, we make it seem more universally dispersed than it is. Carbon footprint, as an example, is not a generalized problem - we know in fact which nations, industries, and extractive practices are most to blame for the destruction of the planet. (Dr. Joshua Bennett)
The message was that the earth is a sacred text to be explored with a comparable attentiveness to the ways we humans study our Quran, Tripitaka, Bible, Vedas, Torah, or Odu ifa. After all, these sacred texts are just human approximations of the original, primary source - nature's earth and her universe.
Great Dismal Swamp Maroons. For ten generations, they operated an anticapitalist system of communal labor. Native Americans, Africans, and African Americans fleeing the colonial frontier and enslavement.
George Washington Carver believed that deficiency in nitrogen can be made up almost wholly by keeping the legumes growing on the soil as much as possible.
Unkindness to anything means an injustice to that thing...the above principles apply with equal force to soil.
He [W. E. B. Du Bois] admonished white people for appreciating an illusion of pristine nature, an imaginary picturesque postcard, while ignoring human suffering and oppression. White people could not bring themselves to see that the suffering of racialized people marred the landscape, so they distorted their vision, avoided reality, and clung to an environmental mirage.
He [Booker T. Whatley] suggested that farmers send out a newsletter to their subscribers to update them on picking dates and farming activities so that they would 'feel as if the farm was their own'.
The Black veganism movement is growing, and today Black people are three times more likely to be vegan than the general population.
In Yoruba religion, nature is regarded as a divinity, and all plants, animals, and landforms have intrinsic value as Sacred Forces of Nature.
It is not true what the Christian bible says about nature being there just for humans to use and dominate. The way of so-called civilization is the way of destruction.
Recent studies show that Christians are less likely to be concerned about the environment than non-Christians. In the UK, Muslims are less likely to be concerned about climate change than the general population due to a faith in the afterlife and divine intervention. Taken together, Abrahamic monotheism is practiced by over half of the world's human population, so it is imperative to address the apparent incongruity between creed and earth wisdom.
It was fascinating to uncover a recent study concluding that, while people of Abrahamic faiths may be less environmentally concerned overall, Black and Hispanic Christians are more concerned about climate change than both white Christians and secular people. Black and Hispanic clergy are also more likely than white clergy to talk about climate change with their congregations.
Dr. George Washington Carver was a devout Christian and believed that nature was God's broadcasting system.
Before we jump into action plans for emissions reductions or other practical measures, we need to focus on amplifying the respect and reverence at the foundation of the relationship. (Angelou Ezeilo)
In 1914, Black families owned 14% of the nation's farms. White supremacist backlash against expanding Black land ownership was swift and severe. More than 4,000 African Americans were lynched between 1877 and 1950. Black landowners were specifically targeted for not 'staying in their place.' White people violently stole at least 24,000 acres of land from 406 Black people, depriving the Black farmers of tens of millions of dollars and often their lives. For example, Kentucky farmer David Walker and his family of seven were attacked by the KKK on October 4, 1908. KKK members burned their house to the ground with one child trapped inside, shot and killed his wife and baby, and wounded the other children. The survivors were run out of town and the 2.5-acre farm was folded into the property of their white neighbor, whose family retains title to the present day.
What happens to earth happens to me. I look at myself as an extension of everything living. (Latria Graham)
Three central ethics of permaculture are earth care, people care, and fair share.
Urban farming in Cuba grew out of necessity after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the US embargo, which curtailed oil supplies. The average Cuban lost 15 to 20 pounds in that time period, and some were near starvation. They had to figure out how to grow food w/o chemical fertilizers and pesticides.
The root of the cotton plant stimulates uterine contractions and was used as an abortifacient. Enslaved women were often forced to submit sexually to planters, owners, and enslaved and free African men in order to increase the enslaved population. 'Even as enslaved women bloodied their hands picking the masters' bolls, they used the roots of the plant to thwart unwanted conception.' (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
When you know that you are related to a being, your neurons fire differently. The love for someone you call your grandmother, brother, sister, of child engages your whole being, including your nervous system, into a compassionate and generous mode. So, if we have a kincentric point of view, then we extend our capacity for compassion out to all living things. (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
The earth is not a place of suffering, and only becomes so when we live in conflict with the earth and each other. (Chris Bolden-Newsome)
Humans would be unable to digest food without the millions of microbes living in each of our guts.
90% of flowering plants have hermaphroditic bisexual flowers that contain both male and female reproductive organs.
Cassava is also an early alarm of imbalance in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Cassava contains toxins that produce cyanide, which have to be boiled or soaked away so the eater is not poisoned and does not end up with paralysis/neurologic disorders. A full week of soaking in water renders cassava tubers safe to eat. In times of climatic and political balance, farmers are able to grow the least toxic varieties of cassava and have ample time to process out the toxins. In times of war and migration, people are moving fast and have less time to process. (Toi Scott)
Whatever we do to our bodies, we do to the earth. Whatever we do to the earth, we do to our bodies. (Toi Scott)
We are addicted to our extractive practices, which assume access to unlimited resources from a limited earth. (Adrienne Maree Brown)
I never get a microaggression from a tree. (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
There is a deep spiritual poverty in the U.S. (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
The plant world takes sunlight and gives the planet everything it needs, which is the ultimate generosity. (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
There is a specialness to the human condition, but it is not superiority. To recognize this truth with humility will fundamentally change how we interact with each other. (Dr. Claudia J. Ford)
After the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, Monsanto arrived with a donation of 60,000 sacks of hybrid and GMO seeds. The Peasant Movement of Papaye, a group of Haitian farmers and a member organization of the international Indigenous led La Via Campesina, pledged to burn the seeds at the port. The called Monsanto's presence "a very strong attack on small agriculture, on farmers, on biodiversity, on Creole seeds...and on what is left of our environment in Haiti...Fighting hybrid and GMO seeds is critical to save our diversity and our agriculture."
Biodiversity is the food system's life insurance. (LP)
We have to remember that eating dark, leafy green vegetables is something that Black people gave to Europeans, not the other way around. (Ira Wallace)
Black three sisters = sorghum, pumpkin, pigeon pea. (Aleya Fraser)
Our version of three mo' sisters is sorghum intercropped with sweet potato and field peas.
Cheap food is not cheap. The cost is borne by other people and the earth. (Ira Wallace)
We need to slow down, connect, and get in tune with the rhythm of the earth if we want to increase our chances of survival. (Aleya Fraser)
The same patriarchal power structure that oppresses and exploits girls, women, and nonbinary people (and constricts and contorts boys and men) also wreaks destruction on the natural world. Dominance, supremacy, violence, extraction, egotism, greed, ruthless competition - these hallmarks of patriarchy fuel the climate crisis just as surely as they do inequality, colluding with racism along the way.
If you have come here to help me, you are wasting your time, but if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together. (Lilla Watson)
We must reframe our understanding of the problem. Climate change is not the problem; climate change is the most horrible symptom of an economic system that has been built for a privileged few to extract every precious resource out of this planet and its people - from our natural resources to the fruits of our human labor. (Colette Pichon Battle)
You must take care of the root to heal the tree. (Queen Quet)
The earth wants us to have the courage to admit we have taken too much, and to recognize that the entire world is paying the price for the privilege and comfort of just a few people on the planet. Humans have taken enough. There are some things that simply to not belong to us, and that we don't get to take, even though they exist and we have the means to take them. It's time to understand value beyond capital. (Colette Pichon Battle)
The white global north discounts people of color, and the white global north also discounts the environment. The natural environment is treated like property in the way many of my ancestors were treated like property. Both the earth and people of color are treated as discardable. (Steve Curwood)
We are human society on the edge of either environmental collapse or social evolution - and how and what we consume is a critical piece of that picture. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
In researching Green Washed, I landed on one simple truth: purchasing green can be good, but buying less is better. This simple truism is key to unlocking the door to our future sustainability. For example, researchers at the Aalto University in Finland showed that an individual's climate impact via CO2 emissions is determined by how many goods they consume. Whether we're talking about energy, clothes, food, or shelter, the sheer volume and pace of our consumption is the root problem. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
Even though societal consumption is clearly the root cause of our climate woes, we don't act because of one unsettling truth. If we were to reduce our consumption to a level that was ecologically sustainable, our entire global economic system would collapse. This isn't hyperbole. Our economic system is based on the need for perpetual growth we either grow our economy or it dies. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
Our economic system does not recognize that Earth is a finite planet with limited resources, nor that perpetual economic growth is not possible. as a whole, Earth is a closed system. Almost all of the resources at our disposal are located within the planet. Our only external input is energy from the sun in the form of solar radiation. A society built to depend heavily on nonrenewable resources is a society built on quicksand. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
Until we rethink our entire economic system and replace GDP as our measurement of success, we will not be able to act in accordance with these natural limits. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
While the Earth will adapt to life w/o humans, we cannot live w/o her. Affluent, capitalistic, white men dominate the conversations about moving to another planet. Their proposal comes from a place of not believing in limits and their deep discomfort with the idea that the planet can control them. Just as adolescents rage against their parents, not wanting to live by their rules and threatening to leave, the juvenile impulse is to escape the limits of the planet. We can't run away from limit. (Kendra Pierre-Louis)
I am a real lover of the spirit of Jesus. He was a revolutionary and he pledged allegiance to the earth. At the same time, the Bible has many parts that are destructive to us and that have taught us shame about our very being. Being Black in the Bible is always negative. The tradition of enslavement is preached and practiced in the Bible. (Alice Walker)
Artists and poetry are essential because they connect us to what we cannot see. They open our eyes to what we are blind to, and help us feel the Mother speaking. (Alice Walker)
Y'all trippin'. The earth would also say the impulse is there to live in harmony with all life, because there clearly are communities all across the planet that live in more robust communion with the planet. We have to honor those realities as actual. I worry that when we talk discursively about ecological catastrophe, we make it seem more universally dispersed than it is. Carbon footprint, as an example, is not a generalized problem - we know in fact which nations, industries, and extractive practices are most to blame for the destruction of the planet. (Dr. Joshua Bennett)
The message was that the earth is a sacred text to be explored with a comparable attentiveness to the ways we humans study our Quran, Tripitaka, Bible, Vedas, Torah, or Odu ifa. After all, these sacred texts are just human approximations of the original, primary source - nature's earth and her universe.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 6, 2023
This book was really amazing that had so many different ideas going on and it was really Truly I I open up. I like how they would do Stories in the beginning of the chapter to Explain what was gonna be about in that chapter. They would give a brief history and what they were Is saying in This chapter. Then they would have people talk about it. I learned a lot about what went On in this country. These black people when They became free they had laws to discourage them from moving forward. They took their land could not get loans. They also talked about Africa and how queer people were accepted through the religion. His book had a lot of different subjects and they were very interesting A lot of people don't know about the black experience. They see art and literature but a lot of them were pioneers to inform it in their lives. The medicine and the herbs were very interesting It's custom over from Africa. They had no choice because nobody was going to help. I especially like it when they were talking about the national parks and how they protec THAN. The black people could not go into the parks if they were afraid. The people who started the National Park system is very racist. This was a A real eye open up for me. I think this book should be taught in schools because there's a lot of different aspect
January 19, 2023
I love this book. The way it is set up as interviews with various individuals in various fields of knowledge is outstanding! It is very interesting to read the different interpretations of Earth Wisdom from the Black perspective, and Indigenous people are also represented. They are the stewards of the land. The BIPOC connection to the Earth (and the earth) is palpable throughout this book and it is a call to not only BIPOC individuals seeking connection to their historical and cultural roots and the roots of the Earth, but it is also for people of my own skin tone (white) who should be advised to take a broader look at their understanding of this rock we all live on, take advice from those who are and have always been more deeply connected to what truly matters, and feel more deeply in congress with the Earth.
March 11, 2023
Contrary to mainstream mythology, the movement to listen to and defend the earth did not begin with Rachel Carson, Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, or any other European-heritage thinker. From the Sahel farmers who turned the desert green, to the enslaved herbalists who cured white and Black folks alike, to the Negro 4-H Wildlife Conservation Camps and Planetwalker’s righteous quest, ecological thought and practice have run deep and wide in Black communities. The people whose skin is the color of earth have long advocated for the well-being of our beloved Mother. Leah Penniman
Toward the end of the week, I remember leaning on my rake, taking a drink, sweating hard, looking down onto the fields as we were in the middle of a workday. The sky was clear, the sun was high, it was hot, and people were working hard—harvesting, weeding, transplanting—but no one seemed to be toiling. There was lots of laughter, and some singing, too. And no one seemed to be suffering. In fact, it seemed precisely the opposite—we seemed to be glad. We seemed to be joyful. We seemed, maybe, to be healing.
As I looked down over those fields, it struck me like a bell—I’ve never seen a truer thing. In case you believed slavery and sharecropping and land theft and general misery was the entirety of Black peoples’ relationship with the earth, here was a different story: all us Black people smiling with our hands (and feet) in the soil. Believe me, I wasn’t the only one who said this as that week concluded, and maybe crying a little bit as we said, “It feels like I’m finally home.”
Home meant being in the ongoing stream of Black and Brown people through time—that enormous, rhizomatic, mycelial, polyvocal, choral community—caring for and being cared for by the land. It meant returning, together, to the beloved earth…deep in the long practice of listening to the earth (one of the beautiful verbs Leah uses to imply closeness, attention, and devotion is listening: those who practice are earth-listeners).
Maybe especially if there’s pain or sorrow to move through: which, for me, maybe for you, too, there is. Though pain and sorrow do not foreclose joy. In fact, and maybe this is some Black earth wisdom: it’s from the sorrow tended together that the joy grows.
After lunch and before getting back to work one day, someone rounded us all up to play a little game. I think they called it the mangrove game. It goes like this: Everyone gathers in a circle within arm’s reach of their neighbors, twists into some swampy arboreal shape, something awkward and teetery that you’d never in a million years be able to hold on one foot. Then you grab hold of who’s next to you, their forearm or shin or hand, and on the count of three, everyone picks up one foot, at which point, I was afraid, we would topple (I was the biggest person in that group and really didn’t want to smoosh anyone). I don’t quite know how to describe to you the pulse, the cinching or gripping up, the sudden rooting of fifteen or twenty people becoming one sturdy organism. But I can tell you we shouted and laughed and looked, some of us, baffled with delight. Baffled by how easy it was, how strong we were, in a grove, all our roots grown together like that. We could’ve done it forever, it seemed to me. Holding each other up. Like the Black earth’s been saying all this time. Dr. Ross Gay
I cannot add anything at all to the words of this amazing, beautiful and inspiring book except thank you.
All-wise Almighty Providence we trace
In trees, and plants, and all the flow’ry race;
As clear as in the nobler frame of man,
All lovely copies of the Maker’s plan.
Infinite Love where’er we turn our eyes
Appears: this ev’ry creature’s wants supplies;
This most is heard in Nature’s constant voice,
This makes the morn, and this the eve rejoice;
This bids the fost’ring rains and dews descend
To nourish all, to serve one gen’ral end . . .
Phillis Wheatley Peters (1773)
Oh Does not Nature teach us primal bliss?
Who has not felt her lessons in his youth
And having felt, who can forget forsooth?
The voice of birds, the toil and hum of bees,
And air all filled with sounds, sweet or uncouth
Dark heights, majestic woods and rolling seas
Have been my teachers, and my teachers still be these.
Albery Whitman (1884)
Up until then, prayer had always been something done at home or in a mosque. He pointed to a small area on the ground, where he had brushed aside twigs and leaves. Our father related a hadith of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be unto him), “Wherever you may be at the time of prayer, you may pray, for the Earth is all a mosque.” In that instant, as we knelt to pray, I understood. The earth is a mosque, and a mosque is sacred; therefore, the earth is sacred. We are all one—all part of the same wonderful fabric of creation.
Ibrahim Abdul-Matin
The earth says that we humans are moving faster than anything alive on this planet. We are moving too fast, and ever accelerating. This cancels the humanness of our practices and turns our lives over to machines. This pace enables the normalization of Earth’s destruction. We are losing the ease of connecting with one another, and our ability to fall in love with our potential as beings on a planet full of other miraculous and incredible beings who know how to live in ways that are not destructive to the whole. The earth says that we belong here and can stop running away. If we allow ourselves to think of this place as our home and to really learn it, to get close to the elements of air, water, and earth, then we will have what we need to sustain ourselves. She would like us to sit our ass down for just five minutes, stop messing with things, and be brave. Toshi Reagon
Through grandmother pine’s decomposing form I travel to the stars and witness the inception of time and space. I see that all of the universe is contained in this singular rotting log. I see that God is contained within, is the Place that contains, and is the Spirit that permeates this ancestor tree, just as God permeates all beings. My heart breaks open with awe and love. I am kneeling before this log and now my kneeling becomes worship, and I listen to what instruction she will impart. Leah Penniman
Toward the end of the week, I remember leaning on my rake, taking a drink, sweating hard, looking down onto the fields as we were in the middle of a workday. The sky was clear, the sun was high, it was hot, and people were working hard—harvesting, weeding, transplanting—but no one seemed to be toiling. There was lots of laughter, and some singing, too. And no one seemed to be suffering. In fact, it seemed precisely the opposite—we seemed to be glad. We seemed to be joyful. We seemed, maybe, to be healing.
As I looked down over those fields, it struck me like a bell—I’ve never seen a truer thing. In case you believed slavery and sharecropping and land theft and general misery was the entirety of Black peoples’ relationship with the earth, here was a different story: all us Black people smiling with our hands (and feet) in the soil. Believe me, I wasn’t the only one who said this as that week concluded, and maybe crying a little bit as we said, “It feels like I’m finally home.”
Home meant being in the ongoing stream of Black and Brown people through time—that enormous, rhizomatic, mycelial, polyvocal, choral community—caring for and being cared for by the land. It meant returning, together, to the beloved earth…deep in the long practice of listening to the earth (one of the beautiful verbs Leah uses to imply closeness, attention, and devotion is listening: those who practice are earth-listeners).
Maybe especially if there’s pain or sorrow to move through: which, for me, maybe for you, too, there is. Though pain and sorrow do not foreclose joy. In fact, and maybe this is some Black earth wisdom: it’s from the sorrow tended together that the joy grows.
After lunch and before getting back to work one day, someone rounded us all up to play a little game. I think they called it the mangrove game. It goes like this: Everyone gathers in a circle within arm’s reach of their neighbors, twists into some swampy arboreal shape, something awkward and teetery that you’d never in a million years be able to hold on one foot. Then you grab hold of who’s next to you, their forearm or shin or hand, and on the count of three, everyone picks up one foot, at which point, I was afraid, we would topple (I was the biggest person in that group and really didn’t want to smoosh anyone). I don’t quite know how to describe to you the pulse, the cinching or gripping up, the sudden rooting of fifteen or twenty people becoming one sturdy organism. But I can tell you we shouted and laughed and looked, some of us, baffled with delight. Baffled by how easy it was, how strong we were, in a grove, all our roots grown together like that. We could’ve done it forever, it seemed to me. Holding each other up. Like the Black earth’s been saying all this time. Dr. Ross Gay
I cannot add anything at all to the words of this amazing, beautiful and inspiring book except thank you.
All-wise Almighty Providence we trace
In trees, and plants, and all the flow’ry race;
As clear as in the nobler frame of man,
All lovely copies of the Maker’s plan.
Infinite Love where’er we turn our eyes
Appears: this ev’ry creature’s wants supplies;
This most is heard in Nature’s constant voice,
This makes the morn, and this the eve rejoice;
This bids the fost’ring rains and dews descend
To nourish all, to serve one gen’ral end . . .
Phillis Wheatley Peters (1773)
Oh Does not Nature teach us primal bliss?
Who has not felt her lessons in his youth
And having felt, who can forget forsooth?
The voice of birds, the toil and hum of bees,
And air all filled with sounds, sweet or uncouth
Dark heights, majestic woods and rolling seas
Have been my teachers, and my teachers still be these.
Albery Whitman (1884)
Up until then, prayer had always been something done at home or in a mosque. He pointed to a small area on the ground, where he had brushed aside twigs and leaves. Our father related a hadith of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be unto him), “Wherever you may be at the time of prayer, you may pray, for the Earth is all a mosque.” In that instant, as we knelt to pray, I understood. The earth is a mosque, and a mosque is sacred; therefore, the earth is sacred. We are all one—all part of the same wonderful fabric of creation.
Ibrahim Abdul-Matin
The earth says that we humans are moving faster than anything alive on this planet. We are moving too fast, and ever accelerating. This cancels the humanness of our practices and turns our lives over to machines. This pace enables the normalization of Earth’s destruction. We are losing the ease of connecting with one another, and our ability to fall in love with our potential as beings on a planet full of other miraculous and incredible beings who know how to live in ways that are not destructive to the whole. The earth says that we belong here and can stop running away. If we allow ourselves to think of this place as our home and to really learn it, to get close to the elements of air, water, and earth, then we will have what we need to sustain ourselves. She would like us to sit our ass down for just five minutes, stop messing with things, and be brave. Toshi Reagon
Through grandmother pine’s decomposing form I travel to the stars and witness the inception of time and space. I see that all of the universe is contained in this singular rotting log. I see that God is contained within, is the Place that contains, and is the Spirit that permeates this ancestor tree, just as God permeates all beings. My heart breaks open with awe and love. I am kneeling before this log and now my kneeling becomes worship, and I listen to what instruction she will impart. Leah Penniman
April 17, 2023
There's so much I learnt from the different conversations in this book. I think it is a great guide to help navigate and ponder issues that we are not familiar with. I loved reading about the connections of people in Africa, the US and the Caribbean (Trinidad...my home country) as it concerned seeds, planting, preservation of history. I definitely want to read it again. The fight for racial and environmental justice and our relationship with the earth is so important. This book is so inspiring and eye opening. The lessons shared from respected voices and leaders are invaluable. There's so much work to be done and I am so glad Leah wrote this book.
Want to read
March 2, 2023From the publisher:
Author of Farming While Black and co-founder of Soul Fire Farm, Leah Penniman reminds us that ecological humility is an intrinsic part of Black cultural heritage. While racial capitalism has attempted to sever our connection to the sacred earth for 400 years, Black people have long seen the land and water as family and understood the intrinsic value of nature.
This thought-provoking anthology brings together today’s most respected and influential Black environmentalist voices —leaders who have cultivated the skill of listening to the Earth —to share the lessons they have learned. These varied and distinguished experts include Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award-winning author Alice Walker; the first Queen Mother and official spokesperson for the Gullah/Geechee Nation, Queen Quet; marine biologist, policy expert, and founder and president of Ocean Collectiv, Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson; and the Executive Director of the North Carolina Association of Black Lawyers, Land Loss Prevention Project, Savi Horne. In Black Earth Wisdom, they address the essential connection between nature and our survival and how runaway consumption and corporate insatiability are harming the earth and every facet of American society, engendering racial violence, food apartheid, and climate injustice.
Those whose skin is the color of soil are reviving their ancestral and ancient practice of listening to the earth for guidance. Penniman makes clear that the fight for racial and environmental justice demands that people put our planet first and defer to nature as our ultimate teacher.
This book was soulful and soul stirring. It brilliantly combined scholarship from the academy with the knowledge that was passed down and felling. I would recommend this alongside Soil by Camille Dungy.
Author of Farming While Black and co-founder of Soul Fire Farm, Leah Penniman reminds us that ecological humility is an intrinsic part of Black cultural heritage. While racial capitalism has attempted to sever our connection to the sacred earth for 400 years, Black people have long seen the land and water as family and understood the intrinsic value of nature.
This thought-provoking anthology brings together today’s most respected and influential Black environmentalist voices —leaders who have cultivated the skill of listening to the Earth —to share the lessons they have learned. These varied and distinguished experts include Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award-winning author Alice Walker; the first Queen Mother and official spokesperson for the Gullah/Geechee Nation, Queen Quet; marine biologist, policy expert, and founder and president of Ocean Collectiv, Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson; and the Executive Director of the North Carolina Association of Black Lawyers, Land Loss Prevention Project, Savi Horne. In Black Earth Wisdom, they address the essential connection between nature and our survival and how runaway consumption and corporate insatiability are harming the earth and every facet of American society, engendering racial violence, food apartheid, and climate injustice.
Those whose skin is the color of soil are reviving their ancestral and ancient practice of listening to the earth for guidance. Penniman makes clear that the fight for racial and environmental justice demands that people put our planet first and defer to nature as our ultimate teacher.
This book was soulful and soul stirring. It brilliantly combined scholarship from the academy with the knowledge that was passed down and felling. I would recommend this alongside Soil by Camille Dungy.
March 20, 2023
This is a really fascinating collection of interviews with Black environmentalists - scientists, journalists, environmental justice activists, regenerative farmers, lawyers fighting against Black land loss, and more. It also covers the history of Black connection to the environment, from regenerative farming techniques developed in Africa millennia ago to Harriet Tubman's use of her deep ecological knowledge to guide escaped enslaved people to freedom to the modern environmental justice movement.
I also really appreciated that the author interviewed a wide variety of people, including queer and trans people, and people who are connected to the land through their spirituality - Christianity, Islam, Vodun, Ifa, and more - as well as people who aren't particularly spiritual but still have a deep connection with nature.
(I did skim over the interview with Alice Walker, because unfortunately she's gone down an antisemitic, transphobic rabbit hole in the last few years. As far as I can tell she didn't say anything bigoted in the book, and I hope that the author was unaware of those views when she chose to interview Walker - but personally I can't take Walker's views seriously anymore.)
I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn more about the history and current practice of Black environmentalism, much of which has been erased by mainstream coverage of the environmental movement. I think it goes really well with another book I love, Healing Grounds: Climate, Justice, and the Deep Roots of Regenerative Farming by Liz Carlisle.
I also really appreciated that the author interviewed a wide variety of people, including queer and trans people, and people who are connected to the land through their spirituality - Christianity, Islam, Vodun, Ifa, and more - as well as people who aren't particularly spiritual but still have a deep connection with nature.
(I did skim over the interview with Alice Walker, because unfortunately she's gone down an antisemitic, transphobic rabbit hole in the last few years. As far as I can tell she didn't say anything bigoted in the book, and I hope that the author was unaware of those views when she chose to interview Walker - but personally I can't take Walker's views seriously anymore.)
I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn more about the history and current practice of Black environmentalism, much of which has been erased by mainstream coverage of the environmental movement. I think it goes really well with another book I love, Healing Grounds: Climate, Justice, and the Deep Roots of Regenerative Farming by Liz Carlisle.
October 20, 2024
I would call this book a form of Afrofuturism. Rather than digging too deeply into anyone aspect of environmentalism, this book takes a broad look at the real and perceived relationships between the African diaspora and environmental futures.
While it is obviously covering a complex and often disheartening topic, the book’s overall tone is hopeful. The contributors ask us to pay attention and listen and find ways to reconnect with the Earth, often in a way that challenges Western concepts of capitalism and environmentalism. I think the framework set up by the author not only makes this book accessible, but also offers suggestions that are available to all readers, rather than wallowing in a sense of doom. As someone who frequently wallows in a sense of doom about this topic, I found this refreshing and inspiring.
We can’t change our trajectory unless we can imagine a better future and how to get there, and I think this book is a good resource for that.
While it is obviously covering a complex and often disheartening topic, the book’s overall tone is hopeful. The contributors ask us to pay attention and listen and find ways to reconnect with the Earth, often in a way that challenges Western concepts of capitalism and environmentalism. I think the framework set up by the author not only makes this book accessible, but also offers suggestions that are available to all readers, rather than wallowing in a sense of doom. As someone who frequently wallows in a sense of doom about this topic, I found this refreshing and inspiring.
We can’t change our trajectory unless we can imagine a better future and how to get there, and I think this book is a good resource for that.
May 9, 2023
Black Earth Wisdom: Soulful Conversations with Black Environmentalists
by Leah Penniman
Released February 28, 2023
This is a great collection from various scholars. There were some intriguing and fascinating accounts of traditional worship throughout the Black Diaspora. There will be triggers surrounding Black Folks and home grown terrorism. If nothing else, this will provoke more curiosity and research from the reader. Its a slow burn with an academic historical feel but I enjoyed the narration of this history.
#LeahPenniman. #BlackEarthWisdom #NetGalley #EARTHListeners
A soulful collection of illuminating essays and interviews that explore Black people's spiritual and scientific connection to the land, waters, and climate, curated by the acclaimed author of Farming While Black
Author of Farming While Black and co-founder of Soul Fire Farm, Leah Penniman reminds us that ecological humility is an intrinsic part of Black cultural heritage. While racial capitalism has attempted to sever our connection to the sacred earth for 400 years, Black people have long seen the land and water as family and understood the intrinsic value of nature.
This thought-provoking anthology brings together today's most respected and influential Black environmentalist voices —leaders who have cultivated the skill of listening to the Earth —to share the lessons they have learned. These varied and distinguished experts include Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award-winning author Alice Walker; the first Queen Mother and official spokesperson for the Gullah/Geechee Nation, Queen Quet; marine biologist, policy expert, and founder and president of Ocean Collectiv, Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson; and the Executive Director of the North Carolina Association of Black Lawyers, Land Loss Prevention Project, Savi Horne. In Black Earth Wisdom, they address the essential connection between nature and our survival and how runaway consumption and corporate insatiability are harming the earth and every facet of American society, engendering racial violence, food apartheid, and climate injustice.
Those whose skin is the color of soil are reviving their ancestral and ancient practice of listening to the earth for guidance. Penniman makes clear that the fight for racial and environmental justice demands that people put our planet first and defer to nature as our ultimate teacher.
Contributors include:
Alice Walker
adrienne maree brown
Dr. Ross Gay
Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson
Rue Mapp
Dr. Carolyn Finney
Audrey Peterman
Awise Agbaye Wande Abimbola
Ibrahim Abdul-Matin
Kendra Pierre-Louis
Latria Graham
Dr. Lauret Savoy
Ira Wallace
Savi Horne
Dr. Claudia Ford
Dr. J. Drew Lanham
Dr. Leni Sorensen
Queen Quet
Toshi Reagon
Yeye Luisah Teish
Yonnette Fleming
Naima Penniman
Angelou Ezeilo
James Edward Mills
Teresa Baker
Pandora Thomas
Toi Scott
Aleya Fraser
Chris Bolden-Newsome
Dr. Joshua Bennett
B. Anderson
Chris Hill
Greg Watson
T. Morgan Dixon
Dr. Dorceta Taylor
Colette Pichon Battle
Dillon Bernard
Sharon Lavigne
Steve Curwood
and Babalawo Enroue Halfkenny
Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.
by Leah Penniman
Released February 28, 2023
This is a great collection from various scholars. There were some intriguing and fascinating accounts of traditional worship throughout the Black Diaspora. There will be triggers surrounding Black Folks and home grown terrorism. If nothing else, this will provoke more curiosity and research from the reader. Its a slow burn with an academic historical feel but I enjoyed the narration of this history.
#LeahPenniman. #BlackEarthWisdom #NetGalley #EARTHListeners
A soulful collection of illuminating essays and interviews that explore Black people's spiritual and scientific connection to the land, waters, and climate, curated by the acclaimed author of Farming While Black
Author of Farming While Black and co-founder of Soul Fire Farm, Leah Penniman reminds us that ecological humility is an intrinsic part of Black cultural heritage. While racial capitalism has attempted to sever our connection to the sacred earth for 400 years, Black people have long seen the land and water as family and understood the intrinsic value of nature.
This thought-provoking anthology brings together today's most respected and influential Black environmentalist voices —leaders who have cultivated the skill of listening to the Earth —to share the lessons they have learned. These varied and distinguished experts include Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award-winning author Alice Walker; the first Queen Mother and official spokesperson for the Gullah/Geechee Nation, Queen Quet; marine biologist, policy expert, and founder and president of Ocean Collectiv, Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson; and the Executive Director of the North Carolina Association of Black Lawyers, Land Loss Prevention Project, Savi Horne. In Black Earth Wisdom, they address the essential connection between nature and our survival and how runaway consumption and corporate insatiability are harming the earth and every facet of American society, engendering racial violence, food apartheid, and climate injustice.
Those whose skin is the color of soil are reviving their ancestral and ancient practice of listening to the earth for guidance. Penniman makes clear that the fight for racial and environmental justice demands that people put our planet first and defer to nature as our ultimate teacher.
Contributors include:
Alice Walker
adrienne maree brown
Dr. Ross Gay
Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson
Rue Mapp
Dr. Carolyn Finney
Audrey Peterman
Awise Agbaye Wande Abimbola
Ibrahim Abdul-Matin
Kendra Pierre-Louis
Latria Graham
Dr. Lauret Savoy
Ira Wallace
Savi Horne
Dr. Claudia Ford
Dr. J. Drew Lanham
Dr. Leni Sorensen
Queen Quet
Toshi Reagon
Yeye Luisah Teish
Yonnette Fleming
Naima Penniman
Angelou Ezeilo
James Edward Mills
Teresa Baker
Pandora Thomas
Toi Scott
Aleya Fraser
Chris Bolden-Newsome
Dr. Joshua Bennett
B. Anderson
Chris Hill
Greg Watson
T. Morgan Dixon
Dr. Dorceta Taylor
Colette Pichon Battle
Dillon Bernard
Sharon Lavigne
Steve Curwood
and Babalawo Enroue Halfkenny
Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.
May 8, 2025
I can't write a review sufficient for a work this important! The roster of contributors is insane; so much experience in listening to the earth, stewarding the land in humility and love, and fighting for environmental justice. I picked up this book looking to shift my approach to stewarding the land from the colonial settler thinking to one of "ecological humility." A lot of what struck me about this book can be summed up in this passage: "The Queen Mothers of Kroboland, Ghana admonished their Black American students in disbelief, “Is it true that in the United States, a farmer will put the seed into the ground and not pour any libations, offer any prayers, sing, or dance, and expect that seed to grow?” Met with ashamed silence, they continued, “That is why you are all sick! Because you see the earth as a thing and not a being."
February 20, 2023
Many thanks to Amistad and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this wonderful book.
BLACK EARTH WISDOM by Leah Penniman is a revelatory and revolutionary work of nonfiction. Written as a series of interviews of BIPOC environmental activists, artists, and scholars, it is full of sacred wisdom and scientific facts about how BIPOC people have always had--and should continue to have--an ongoing history with the earth and nature. Although I found myself wishing to know more about what I, as an individual, could do to save the environment and listen to what Mother Earth is telling me, I still found this work incredibly inspiring. Thanks to this book, I now know my place in Black environmental history, and that, on its own, is a true gift.
BLACK EARTH WISDOM by Leah Penniman is a revelatory and revolutionary work of nonfiction. Written as a series of interviews of BIPOC environmental activists, artists, and scholars, it is full of sacred wisdom and scientific facts about how BIPOC people have always had--and should continue to have--an ongoing history with the earth and nature. Although I found myself wishing to know more about what I, as an individual, could do to save the environment and listen to what Mother Earth is telling me, I still found this work incredibly inspiring. Thanks to this book, I now know my place in Black environmental history, and that, on its own, is a true gift.
August 10, 2024
Like rich Black soil is ideal for growing crop, “Black Earth Wisdom,” apprises us that our cooperation with earth is essential to the evolution, of our species. Through a series of interviews and essays from various renown environmentalists, gardeners and farmers, we learn it is mandatory to form a stronger symbiotic connection to the planet. The book admonishes humans that all life on earth exists - from the darkest depths of the ocean to the top of the highest mountain – in a narrow, twelve-mile strip of habitability called a “biosphere.” This zone of life on Earth must be conserved, for our own subsistence/survival.
May 19, 2025
I felt a deep connection listening to this novel. I listen to the audiobook while out on my daily walks. As the book explored the connections that my ancestors and kin had toward the earth, I felt a deep sense of grounding. Often after listening to several chapters, I would sit on a bench and gaze out at a lake, becoming lost in how the wind would brush the water creating ripples that somehow felt like a mighty force consuming me with a deep sense of peace. The earth is powerful. The earth is nurturing. I seek to rekindle my earthly roots and give back to this planet that has given me so much, even in my neglect.
January 30, 2023
Thank you NetGalley and publishers for the opportunity to read and review! This was such an insightful and inspirational read! So much knowledge placed in the book gave me even more love and joy for our earth. I always love learning about BIPOC's connection to the earth and finding certain things that were revered in one community to be the same or similar with respect to the region of flora and fauna. Honestly, I recommend anyone to read the book to find more beauty in Mother Earth and learn how many cultures cultivate ways to be connected with our earth and revere it as well!
March 18, 2023
Leah Penniman's Black Earth Wisdom blew my hair back. This collection of essays was crafted by experts in their field and is brimming with expertise, knowledge, and analysis that I didn't know I desperately needed until I picked up this read. I'm so overwhelmed with the masterpiece of the project of this work that I think I'll now add it to my annual reads. BRAVO!
I received a review copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley for my honest review. The opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.
I received a review copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley for my honest review. The opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.
June 27, 2023
Eye opening book about environmentalism in the US and globally, how the first environmentalists were Black, and not to overlook the relationship about those whose skin is the color of soil and their relationship to the earth. There were tears because of how beautiful these interviews were and I can wholeheartedly recommend this book to everyone I know. I learned so much about the way the world works from this book and want to thank Leah Penniman for the wisdom that she has shared through these interviews and her own stories.
July 26, 2023
It is one thing to say we need a new relationship to the earth, and another thing to model it. I am always on the hunt for role models, so I read this book with an intense hunger to hear from both Leah Penniman and the many people she interviews. I’m not sure I’ve ever read an interview format book before, but I think it’s a great idea. Penniman models how to be civic, how to get along, how to be democratic, in her deep questions and respect for the very different people she listens to here. And the people she has assembled in here? I want to learn from all of them. Truly a necessary book.
December 14, 2023
This book is one of the best books that I've ever read about the intersections of environmental justice and racial justice. Honestly, I highly recommend reading this book if you're interested in learning about environmental justice from diverse voices. I'm not an active member of environmental justice so this is useful to read so I can learn more.
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