Redefining Our Relationship with the Earth

As part of their 5th Annual Week of Cultural Resistance, the UC Berkeley Multicultural Community Center (MCC) hosted a day of events on March 9 centering on the theme of ‘Redefining Our Relationship With the Earth’. Candle-making, herbal medicine and self-sustainability skillshare workshops and an impassioned interactive community dialogue on environmental justice and racism formed a multi-layered event designed to facilitate participants in imagining new ways to cultivate multiple paths of caring for themselves, their communities and the Earth.

Self-taught herbalist and co-founder of the California Women of Color Herbal Symposium, Kanchan from Spiral Gardens Community Food Security Project led a plant-based hands-on workshop drawing on the relationships and affinities that humans share with the environment. She highlighted the precious need to strengthen and rebuild those relationships, particularly for people for color, whose ancestral knowledge and power lies within, and has been severed from, the very structure that builds and sustains life itself; soil. Through simple practices such as creating home-made herbal salves from local plant and herb varieties, micro-scale gardening for those with limited or no outdoor space and seed saving techniques, Kanchan shared a range of practical skills to empower students to take care of their health and their environment through building and growing in their local soil.

Youth from Los Angeles-based social and environmental justice organization Communities for a Better Environment (CBE) led a thought-provoking activity-based dialogue highlighting the environmental injustices experienced by people of color across California. Through a range of activities, participants were encouraged to reflect upon their relationships with the environment, sharing their stories, experiences and unique perspectives. CBE members facilitated an open space through which to contemplate and contribute to discussions confronting the multiple toxicities people of color face within their own backyards and communities; a legacy born of industrial byproducts and systematic racism. Through community building and education, CBE youth in conjunction with MCC facilitators inspired the building of a collective capacity to breathe life into legacy; to redefine and reclaim their connection to the environment, one that is both socially and environmentally just.

A welcoming and inclusive space for students and community members, the MCC’s ‘Redefining our Relationship with the Earth’s’ multiple events facilitated a cross/inter-cultural community building of knowledge, skills and connection for Berkeley’s culturally diverse student population. Their 16th Night Annual Night of Cultural Resistance – featuring live performances, art making, food and other activities to celebrate cultural resilience and vitality – will be held tonight, 5 – 9pm at the UC Berkeley Multicultural Community Centre.