Food sovereignty! An interview with Linda Black Elk
I speak with Linda Black Elk about ways to promote and protect food sovereignty, traditional plant knowledge, and environmental quality.
How do we become better connected with our food? This week on the Foodie Pharmacology podcast, I speak with Linda Black Elk, an ethnobotanist and food sovereignty activist specializing in teaching about culturally important plants and their uses as food and medicine.
What is Food Sovereignty?
“Food sovereignty is the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems. It puts the aspirations and needs of those who produce, distribute and consume food at the heart of food systems and policies rather than the demands of markets and corporations.”
– Declaration of Nyéléni, the first global forum on food sovereignty, Mali, 2007
Makoce Ikikcupi
Linda also shares information on an exciting project of Reparative Justice. Makoce Ikikcupi, meaning Land Recovery, is a project of Reparative Justice on Dakota land in Minisota Makoce (Minnesota).
Dakota people were systematically dispossessed of their homeland and currently reside on about .01 % (about one-hundredth of one percent) of our original land base within the borders of what is now the State of Minnesota. The Makoce Ikikcupi project seeks to bring some of the Dakota relatives home, re-establish their spiritual and physical relationship with our homeland, and ensure the ongoing existence of their People. Their cultural survival depends on it.
Want to learn more? Visit their website to see examples of their village projects and explore ways you can contribute to this important initiative.
About Linda
Linda is the Food Sovereignty Coordinator at United Tribes Technical College in Bismarck, North Dakota, where she passes ethnobotanical and food systems knowledge on to her amazing students. When she isn’t teaching, Linda spends her time foraging, hiking, hunting, and fishing on the prairies and waters of the northern Great Plains with her husband and three sons, who are all members of the Ohceti Shakowin, the Seven Council Fires of the Lakota. Follow her work on Facebook @lindablackelk and on TikTok and Instagram at @Linda.Black.Elk
Watch and listen to the interview
The full video version of the interview is on YouTube. Or, you can listen to the podcast on any of your favorite podcast streaming services. Subscribe to Foodie Pharmacology to access new episodes weekly.
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Yours in health, Dr. Quave
Cassandra L. Quave, Ph.D. is a disabled writer, speaker, podcast host, wife, mother, explorer, ethnobotanist, and professor at Emory University School of Medicine. She teaches college courses and leads a group of research scientists studying medicinal plants to find new life-saving drugs from nature. She hosts the Foodie Pharmacology podcast and writes the Nature’s Pharmacy newsletter to share the science behind natural medicines. To support her effort, consider a paid or founding subscription, with founding members receiving an autographed 1st edition hardcover copy of her book, The Plant Hunter.