Community-based restoration, conservation, and environmental education
Wemindji: Ethnoecology in a Proposed Marine-terrestrial Protected Area Project, 2008 - 2009
Prior to my work with Haudenosaunee educators and community members, I carried out research with members of the Wemindji community and a university research team based at McGill, Concordia, and University of Manitoba (Winnipeg), to document plant diversity on the islands within a proposed terrestrial-marine protected area. Through this work, we wrote about and made educational materials to promote the transmission of knowledge of land-based traditional skills, and the cultural importance of some plants. We collected plant samples, and made herbarium specimens with them, which are now deposited in the Knowledge Centre in the Culture and Wellness Department, Cree Nation of Wemindji. I co-authored a report about plant diversity and cultural significance in the proposed marine-terrestrial protected area, which we presented as a team to Environment Canada, Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Quebec government, and Cree government. From this experience, I co-authored a chapter on the importance of land-based learning in Wemindji, with Katherine Scott and Dorothy Stewart.
