Not Just Nature

This field project, entitled Not Just Nature, consists of three parts: the first being a curriculum by the same name. This curriculum, an arts-based workshop series, has been/is being developed to open conversations to interrogate the colonial and white supremacist concepts of nature that have been created in the United States through a variety of means. The second part of this project is using self as a site of research/critical autoethnography. No field is apolitical, and the creator/researcher will always bring pieces of themselves and their identities to whatever processes they participate in. Thus, throughout my graduate experience I have not only been digging into the theoretical frameworks of pedagogy but questioning my own current and historical familial relationships with land in the United States, as well as querying my role as a white settler to do this work. The final piece is the write-up itself. Using a more circular rather than linear narrative, it presents in some ways as a portfolio. This paper includes papers written for classes engaging with the questions I have been asking, reflective pieces on the history of how mapping, naming, and artwork have helped to shape views on the environment in the United States, and my own artwork engaging with storied self and land. While this work is not and should not ever be complete, this project demonstrates the process that I have gone through and ultimately should inspire/assist others in beginning these processes for themselves.