Ep. 224 : Animal Forms with Miki Tamblyn

Animal Forms is a project is all about empathy, about remembering how to be in connection with the other-than-human world. As Miki asks, “aims to explore how we (humans) can imagine ourselves in the place of the other people we share our planet with. How might our thoughts and actions change if we practiced seeing the world through another's eyes?”
Miki Tamblyn has created a project where folks can practice being an other-than-human animal.
We sat down at the site of the project, along the Eramosa River in Guelph to discuss inspiration, project formation, overall response to the project and its goals, as well as the experience of embodiment of another form of life.

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Ep. 223 : Moth Garden with Lisa Hirmer and Christina Kingsbury

In some circles, reciprocate is the new “sustainable”, a hot word which implies a lot but isn’t always doing what we might imagine. But how can we try to actually live up to, and create the reciprocity, the giving back and forth, to that and those who give us so much?
For me, Moth Garden feels like a project trying to demonstrate reciprocity in a real, tangible, replicable ways. Christina Kingsbury and Lisa Hirmer have been researching, planting, growing and shaping a garden with an intention of creating sensory worlds for/of the more-than-human, nourishing spaces planted with food, shelter, and room for transformation and rest; planted for often maligned and misunderstood members of our broad interspecies communities.

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Ep. 214 : North American Flycatchers with Cin-Ty Lee and Andrew Birch

Cardinals, Blue Jays, Robins, Mourning Doves, Mallards, Black-capped Chickadees. Quite common and familiar birds most folks seem to know. One of the reasons is that they have very distinct patterning and physical traits that render them easily identifiable. Even some of the Sparrows can be differentiated by a slightly advanced beginner. Flycatchers? They can be tough. When I see a Yellow-bellied Flycatcher (Empidonax flaviventris) in the woods, despite being one of the more recognizable, determinable Empidonax species, I am still left uncertain, full of doubt and just generally end up calling it a Flycatcher.
I spoke with Cin-Ty and Andrew about their new book and how this new method of identification can help us not only better identify some of the Flycatchers, but also to look at how we regard all birds in ways that encounter them more fully, experiencing them in broader context through investigating narrower characteristics.

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Ep. 207 : Journey With Our Kin with Dani Kastelein-Longlade and Amina Lalor

Dani Kastelein-Longlade and Amina Lalor along with with guest artists Katherine Rae Diemert and Brenda Mabel Reid have created an inspiring and beautiful exhibition, Journey With Our Kin, at the Queens Square Idea Exchange gallery in Cambridge Ontario. The exhibition is open until Feb. 5th, 2023.

I got to talk with Dani and Amina about their work at the exhibition, and about how getting to know the lands where we live may interrupt the colonial frameworks we daily navigate. We discuss relationships with the land, the Nokom’s House project we have all been a part of, and about their place in the world along with varied identities, passions, and work they take up.

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Ep. 185 : In conversation with Lorraine Roy, and Greg Kennedy SJ.

By calling, Greg is a Jesuit priest. Lorraine, a textile artist. Both have a keen eye for observation, and translation. Learning to see the wonder and awe embedded in the guardians of the air we collectively breathe, the trees, they render the arboreal grace and might into earthly transmissions which allow us to know the land a little better.
On Earth Day weekend, April 22-24, Greg Kennedy, Lorraine Roy and I will be facilitating a retreat at the Ignatius Jesuit Centre with the theme of Trees. In this conversation we share some of why we are involved in this project, and to reflect on what brought us to this work, who has inspired us, and what we hope to bring to this emergent weekend.

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Ep. 162 : Talking trees with Dawn Matheson

Dawn Matheson wants to start connecting with trees, or a specific tree rather, at the University of Guelph Arboretum but she’s unsure which one yet. There is a process to get to know a tree and she is in the midst of sorting out that process. How do you find a friend in a tree when the culture around us says humans and trees can’t be friends? Well, she makes friends with other humans who are already friends with trees and starts from there.

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Ep. 141 : Talking to Jam Doughty, non-binary nature educator, and creature drawer

How do we talk to the young people in our lives about our the complexities in the world around us? What about the subtleties and possibilities within our own experiences of ourselves? How do you challenge those we work with and for to push beyond lip service to racial equity and create real solidarity in our daily jobs? How does one do this amidst a culture of white supremacy, heterocentrism, and a pandemic, seemingly getting more and more out of hand?

All this and more in conversation with Jam Doughty, non-binary nature educator, and creature drawer