Against the patriarchy
Using the power of land to transform from within
Cultivating environments has been a beautiful practice as a steward who belongs to land. It is my time with land that has brought me to this understanding of love that extends beyond "Human" wisdom. First, I have to thank my mother for enveloping my early childhood as an Undocumented child in the U.S with love and for bringing with her the seeds she brought with her when she crossed the border. Seeds that carried Indigenous philosophies I needed to protect myself from the Patriarchy. With the placement of her love, she planted these seeds in my heart and mind, giving me the ability to accept the love of the land I later began to seek.
The manner in which the patriarchy gains power is through violence and the domination of the land and its people. By building relationships with land, people are able to break the hold the patriarchy has on our bodies and minds. This relationship with land can give us the power to transform from within and exist outside the binary world imposed on us by the Patriarchy through community, food, and ceremonial work. The Patriarchy will always be threatened by relationships that people continue to have based on epistemic locality, rather than sameness and control of land.
In My first project, Black And Indigenous Futures, the work established that true liberation and control of our futures is only through the liberation of the land, but that as a collective we must address the trauma that has come from being separated from land while preparing to protect and fight for the land that our bodies, minds, and relationships are tethered to it, thus, “The Future of Black And Indigenous people is one of healing through the land”.
Against The Patriarchy
This photo project depicts people building relationships with land, working the soil with their hands, and harvesting food for communities. Most of all learning what love is through the land. So much of our separation from land has caused us to lack love in ourselves. This speaks in the way we treat the land and women. "Against the Patriarchy '', reveals the forms in which land take as the anti-power of the Patriarchy and applying that power of the land to cultivate environments where the men around me can transform from within with this understanding of love that comes from land
