Acorns and oak leaves photo illustration from “Bitter Medicine is Stronger,” a page from the website companion to the book, “The Multispecies Salon.” Click on photo for link to site.

Explore the acorn mush tradition of the Pomo people of northern California and through that, a window to the displacement of native people and native plant species on Thursday, Sept. 24, at the first of a series of lunchtime discussions hosted by the Princeton Environmental Institute.

PEI writes:

“The discussions will orbit around two key questions: Which beings flourish, and which fail, when natural and cultural worlds intermingle and collide? In the aftermath of disasters—in blasted landscapes that have been transformed by multiple catastrophes—what are the possibilities of biocultural hope?”

The first event, “Suburban Foraging: Acorn Mush,” begins with acorn gathering at 10 a.m. at Guyot atrium. Lunch, mush-tasting and discussion follow at 12:30 p.m. to 2 p.m. and will be led by Kimberly Tallbear, associate professor of native studies at the University of Alberta; Linda Noel, a Koyungkawi poet (click here for an interview with her); Tom Boellstorff, author of the essay (PDF) up for discussion and a professor of anthropology at UC Irvine, as virtual guest; and Henry Horn, Princeton University emeritus professor of ecology and evolutionary biology.

“The Multispecies Salon” was initially an art exhibition. Gleanings from exhibition  – essays and recipes – co-authored by Kim Tallbear, Linda Noel and others, were gathered into a book edited by Eben Kirksey, currently a visiting professor at Princeton Environmental Institute and in the anthropology department. Read a Kirksey interview here.

Background: Native plants and peoples persist in suburbs that have been altered by long histories of white settler colonialism and commercial development. In the case of the oak and its acorns, the bitter mush product evokes the history of massacres, forced marches, and internment for the Pomo, and also the challenges that native plant species face.

The Thursday event will focus on an essay, “Bitter Medicine is Stronger” (abstract) and acorn mush recipe from the book by collaborators Noel and Tallbear, and the Boellstorff essay, “Botanical Decolonization: Rethinking Native Plants,” which explores ideas of Francis Bacon along the way to arguing that

“planting and displanting humans and plants are elements of the same multispecies colonial endeavor, and that native plant advocacy is part of a broad process of botanical decolonization and a strategic location for ethical action in the Anthropocene.”

Please RSVP and register here, or catch the livestream here. Because of space constraints, Multispecies Salon events are restricted to members of the university community, except by special request.