The remnants of colonialism,
containment, enclosure by concentration camp, religion, war and violence, the
ocean herself. And then there is
healing. Healing through the assemblage of words, images, historical texts,
definition, redefinition, redefining. A
different narrative showing through the spaces between words and phrases,
arpeggios built out of [land, soil, earth, ground] [tano] ocean, sky… bridges
of words connecting tidelands, lisiensan ga’lago, aerial parts, fino haya, fino
lago* to write a new lexicon of belonging.
The weaving of text,
history, image, poetry in “achiote” held onto me. Thinking about the ways that our knowledges
come to us, are built on ancestral knowledges, by knowing ourselves, our
places, our relationship to magic, and our
knowledges are broken by power, domination.
“Scaffold the course of
submission” and we will surely forget our way.
Build it into hegemonic global pathologies of thought and we wont
recognize the structure. Make our own sense of belonging so foreign we will forget our names,
our words, our medicine, our ability to heal.
We become infected and agents of dissemination.
““I am “from unincorporated
territory.” From indicates a/ particular
time or place as a starting point; from indicates a/particular time or place as
a starting point; from refers to/ a specific location as the first of two
limits; from imagines/ a source, a cause an agent, or an instrument; from mars/
separation, removal, or exclusion” (11)
Colonialism and science have
always been linked, the careful collecting, categorizing, classifying,
assessing and placing into hierarchies was a tool of conquest. The discipline
of Botany has always been one of regarding plant life as a resource and
commodity. The careful way that the
achoite is handled illuminates the complicated relationship between plant and the
proliferation of different life through colonial means.
How do plants colonize? how do we care our ancestral knowledge in the
face of hegemonic forms of knowledge making that seeks to obscure
through erasure and violence?
"How do plants colonize? how do we care our ancestral knowledge in the face of hegemonic forms of knowledge making that seeks to obscure through erasure and violence?"
ReplyDeleteThat is a good question, I think Perez's book does a great job at answering that question in form of reclamation of his native tongue, Chamorro. And also making light of the violence his family and land have witnessed since colonization of Guam.
As for your first question, how do plants colonize? mmmm that is a good question, I'm not much of a gardener or the best grower of plants but in order for a foreign plant to overrule a land that they are not indigenous to would a person/colonizer have to bring that plant there and let it grow and overrule the other plants? Now you got me thinking on this one...
Amber went right where i was going to go after this post. The idea of plants colonizing is compelling b/c we know that can be colonized. So apt!
ReplyDeletee