Kirkus Review
A welcome compilation of interviews with Indigenous Americans about climate change. Jamail is a Martha Gellhorn Award--winning journalist, and Rushworth is a California-based teacher of Native American literature. As the editors demonstrate, all of the contributors to this dynamic collection are rooted in ancient cultural philosophies that radically challenge non-Native ideas about climate change. "For the Indigenous people of the world," writes Rushworth in the preface, "radical alteration of the planet, and of life itself, is a story many generations long." Jamail goes on to point out that Native Americans have already witnessed massive destruction in the past few centuries, ranging from the annihilation of the buffalo from the Great Plains to the decimation of Native populations "as a result of sanctioned settler mayhem." Consequently, Indigenous Americans are uniquely equipped to philosophically and practically tackle climate change. At the heart of these interviews is a rejection of current practices. Before colonization, Native peoples like the Hopi spent centuries perfecting systems that successfully cared for the Earth. This balance was disturbed by European colonizers who created what Ilarion, a Yupik elder, describes as a "reverse society" or "inside out society." Ilarion argues that the only way to cope with climate change is to reject Eurocentric notions of "normal" and to adopt Indigenous ways of thinking and being. Interviewees suggest a variety of abstract and concrete avenues for doing so--e.g., Potawatomi scholar Kyle Powys Whyte's recommendation to alter our relationship with clock time or Quinault President Fawn Sharp's idea to use Native knowledge to preemptively shift her constituents' homes to flood-safe areas. Throughout, contributors remind us that the Earth has survived for billions of years and will survive for billions more; humans, however, may not. Readers will be impressed by both the depth and breadth of the interviews as well as the contributors' evocative, vivid storytelling and palpable emotion. A refreshingly unique and incredibly informative collection of vital Indigenous wisdom. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
This timely compilation of interviews shines a spotlight on the environmental knowledge of 20 individuals who belong to Native Nations. Rushworth, a Native American educator and activist, and Jamail, an award-winning journalist, spoke with a wide variety of Indigenous academics, artists, and community leaders, seeking to center their voices in the ever-intensifying debate about how to heal a hurting planet. Rushworth poses this question of enormous urgency to Edgar Ibarra, a college student and abolitionist activist: "Our focus is the disruption of Earth; how did we get here? How do we move on in the right way?" The interviewees speak freely, generating the warmth of intimate conversation and pointing to numerous solutions already at work in Indigenous communities. Dr. Melissa K. Nelson, a proponent of tribal food sovereignty, sees the COVID-19 pandemic as proof of humanity's failure to understand that every natural resource, including air, is communal. Musician Lyla June Johnston acknowledges that since many Native Nations have survived previous epidemics and social collapse, there's much to learn from intertribal conflicts. Pulitzer Prize--winning poet Natalie Diaz elucidates arising emergencies in the English language itself. Insights like these, and dozens more, deserve deep attention and will hopefully spur readers into action to save the planet and themselves.
