Introduction
As we delve into the world of Indigenous food systems, we must realize that—as with most things in Indigenous cultures—all things are interconnected. The lines between food systems, biodiversity management, spirituality, watershed maintenance, and nutrition all blur into one holistic endeavor for many Indigenous systems designers both past and present. Therefore, the list we present below is not only about food, but about the land management practices and cultural institutions that bring this food into being. It is informed by a multitude of scientific disciplines and media genres to help us break open our conception of what “food” means.
For many Indigenous communities, food is not a noun, but a verb, involving a very active societal participation within larger ecosystemic processes and forces of nature. This is true, for example, of the Haíłzaqv Indigenous Nation of Bella Bella Island who augment kelp forests to give the herring more surface area to spawn¹. It is true of the Shawnee Ancestors of Kentucky who maintained 3,000-year-old chestnut groves by spacing the trees properly and routinely burning the meadow in between². It is true of the Mebêngôkre Indigenous Nation of Brazil who transform nutrient poor clay into fertile dark earths through ancient soil management techniques on massive scales³. Over millennia countless Indigenous cultures refined ways to cultivate food that simultaneously cultivate the vitality of the ecosystems around them. These societies do not just plant gardens, they plant and manage whole forests. Some do not just oversee oyster farms, they tend entire estuaries. All of the stewardship systems we present below operate on bioregional scales. They do not randomly “hunt” eel from the river but harvest them from infrastructures intentionally designed to generate prolific, predictable, and perennial nutrition, as in the case of the Gundijtmara Nation of Australia.
Examples of Indigenous anthropogenic ecosystems are endless and can teach the world about how to eat from the land and feed the land at the same time. The values, tools, and strategies embodied by these food systems can provide valuable solutions for countless global challenges such as biodiversity loss, climate instability, food systems collapse, social division, and the coexistence of hunger and food waste.
We thus publish this bibliography on the eve of a paradigm shift. Indigenous Nations have long been pigeon-holed as “primitive” and “simple.” They have been miscast as “hunter-gatherers” of “wild” foods, instead of honored as agents of abundance intentionally designed on bioregional scales.
Thomas Moore and John Locke were among colonial intellectuals who believed land could be made “private property” only through a person’s cultivation of that land. Therefore, by their own laws, Indigenous cultivation of lands meant Indigenous land ownership (versus "Terra Nullius", which was open to any European Nation). This strongly incentivized colonial groups to downplay Indigenous land cultivation and instead lean towards the "hunter-gatherer" label.
Emer de Vattel, a French colonial intellectual, wrote in 1798: "Every nation is then obliged by the law of nature to cultivate the land that has fallen to its share . . . Those nations . . . who inhabit fertile countries, but disdain to cultivate their lands . . . are injurious to all their neighbours, and deserve to be extirpated as savage and pernicious beasts." In this way, cultivation of lands became a prerequisite for a people's right to exist. The myth of "virgin land" facilitated the colonial endeavor to seize land and slave labor.
While most Native Nations cultivated their homelands extensively, it was rarely if ever to establish "ownership" of the earth, but rather to fulfill responsibilities to the earth. Their cultivation styles are generally intended to benefit all life, including humans.
For generations, Indigenous Peoples have thus been misrepresented as sparsely populated nomads, eating hand to mouth, eeking a living off the land. This narrative—disproven by the plethora of studies below and more—has eclipsed incredible stories of human ecosystems management and the grandiose food systems of the Americas, Africa, Asia, the Pacific Islands, Australia and beyond.
This overshadowing of history not only distorts historical truths, but bereaves the world of the techniques that could help us create dependable food systems for all. The failure of industrial systems has inspired the world to revisit Indigenous sytems and learn valuable lessons from those practices.
The success of Native American food systems in particular is reflected by the fact that roughly 60% of global food diversity enjoyed by the world today originated in the Americas (also known as Turtle Island and Abya Yala). Moreover, it has been demonstrated that despite comprising only 5% of the global population, Indigenous Peoples (as defined by the United Nations) are estimated to oversee 80% of global biodiversity today.
Despite this distortion of history, strides have been made in several disciplines to understand and disseminate the beauty and sophistication of Indigenous food and environmental systems. It is in this spirit that we, authors of both Indigenous and diasporic descent, offer this list of resources to a world hungry for healthy food and hungry for information. It is intended that a wide and varied audience enjoys and is inspired by this annotated bibliography.
Through this bibliography, we aimed to:
- Inform the creation of secure food systems for all nations, including all nations of plants, animals and other lifeforms;
- Curate a list of resources pertaining to Indigenous food systems, both past and present, with an emphasis on habitat stewardship and habitat expansion;
- Recognize Indigenous People as leaders in sustainability, regenerative practice, and effective food science, and;
- Encourage the return of stolen lands to Indigenous stewardship.
The ways in which Indigenous Peoples sculpted/sculpt the earth, fire, and waters of their homelands have powerful implications for human history, historical ecology, food sovereignty, food policy, sustainability, and how we understand humanity's purpose and role on the planet.
We hope this publication helps to revitalize traditional Indigenous systems and inspire the world toward more sustainable practices. Perhaps most importantly, however, we hope it encourages the return of key homelands to the supervision and stewardship of Indigenous Nations worldwide. In addition to healing the land, it would be so inspiring if humanity also worked to heal history by rectifying past wrongs.
Above all, we hope this serves to improve the world for all people, all creatures, all waters, all climates, and all descendents from now into the future.
Thank you for taking the time to review our offering.
Lyla June Johnston, PhD, Diné (Navajo)/Tsétsêhéstâhese (Cheyenne)/Scottish, University of Alaska, Fairbanks
Conclusion
We hope these articles have piqued the reader's interest in humanity as a keystone species. Ancestors have proven it is possible for humans to be a linchpin upon which entire ecosystems depend and thrive with, which means it is possible for us today as well. Nations can have powerfully regenerative effects on the world around them while simultaneously providing ample food staples and materials for their civilizations. Researchers have thoroughly debunked the idea that Native Nations were sparsely populated and demonstrate the power of these food systems to support dense populations such as ours today.
This volume supports the theory that ancestral Indigenous Peoples of Turtle Island (North America), Abya Yala (South America), Aotearoa (New Zealand), and Australia wielded immense and regenerative influence on their environments through systematic, intentional, generational, and nourishing land management techniques. This renews Western perceptions, which largely framed these populations as primitive “hunter-gatherer" societies, with little to no agency in their respective homelands. By correcting this record, extraordinarily beautiful and important strands of the tapestry of human history and human heritage are remembered and restored.
These studies show us that humanity has the power to augment the natural food-bearing capacity of the land. They blur the line between "nature" and "farm", between "domesticated" and "undomesticated", and between “hunter-gatherer” and "cultivater". They collapse these binaries and show us that by providing a home for plant and animal species (instead of caging them), we can both augment these populations and have plenty to eat at the same time. We show that our foodsheds do not have to be limited to small plots and farms, but can extend through entire forests, mountain ranges, oceans, and estuaries. They show us the ecosystems can and should be farms, and that farms can and should be ecosystems, supporting all life, not just humanity. It highlights the win-win nature of the earth and that humanity thrives when nature thrives, and vice versa.
These articles as a collective point to four important design principles of Indigenous food systems: 1) expand habitat for key species, 2) work with pre-existing forces of nature, 3) design for perpetuity, and 4) decenter humans. Around the world, Indigenous Peoples of every continent provide insightful and sometimes surprising perspectives on food cultivation and the purpose of humanity on the earth. By learning from one another, and expanding our understanding of food, nature, self, and all life, we can begin to practice a fascinating, sustainable, and honorable method of gardening the earth.
Gardening the Earth Map
Click below to view where each of our case studies are located. Bioregions are the natural ecological communities expected in an area defined by specific flora and fauna which would exist without human intervention. Indigenous traditions understand the importance balance within a natural community and utilize this knowledge to cultivate food resources naturally.
Credits:
Created with images by 1xpert - "Clear blue sky and white clouds" • Deemerwha studio - "world map green planet Earth Day or environment day Concept and ecology and environment sustainable concept.,Earth is isolated on white background."