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“Plants Have So Much to Give Us, All we Have to Do is Ask”
by MARY SIISIP GENIUSZ
May-June 2023 Featured Book
Plants Have So Much To Give Us, All we Have to Do is Ask BY MARY SIISIP GENIUSZ
About the book: “Mary Siisip Geniusz makes Anishinaabe botanical information available to native and nonnative healers and educators and emphasizes the Anishinaabe culture that developed the knowledge and practice. Teaching the way she was taught—through stories—Geniusz brings the plants to life with narratives that explain their uses, meaning, and history.” Read more on the book’s page.
Why Carolyn picked this book to feature: This book is a fabulous combination of Anishinaabe wisdom and history, plant knowledge, and recipes! My favorite part about this book was the complete mental shift that occurred while I was reading it. Most of the reading that I have done about plants has been through a western lens—very scientific, methodical, white. Reading this book was like taking a step to the side and looking around that lens. Mary Siisip Geniusz describes the Anishinaabe relationship with plants in a beautiful way, and I hope to bring a little of that into my own life.
I’ll admit I only made it halfway through the book before I needed to return it to the library, but those 160 pages were a delight! I’ll be back for more soon!
Quote we love: Picking one quote was hard, and picking a brief quote was impossible. Part of the charm of this book is the way it reads as though Geniusz is sharing all of this with you slowly over a cup of tea. There’s no rushing this story.
“The shoreline of many of our Northern lakes is lined with lush stands of cattails. Keewaydinoquay [the author’s teacher] always called the plant ‘Defender of the Shoreline,’ which she said was a translation of one of the Anishinaabemowin names for this plant. She linked that Anishinaabe name because it described one of the chief virtues that the plant has to share with the People. . . . The ‘Defenders of the Shoreline’ stand like warriors against the water that would otherwise eat at the land. As land animals, humankind should be more grateful to those plants who hold the land in place for us. And this plant has many other virtues to share with us, too. At any time of the year it has a food for the hungry. The leaves of the cattail in the summer and fall are ready to provide weaving materials. Even in the dead of winter the cattail has a very valuable product to share that will help keep out the cold.”
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Bookshelf Artwork by Green Sparrow Arts
