FIRST WE SHOULD CONSIDER MANOOMIN (WILD RICE): CO-PRODUCING INTERDISCIPLINARY ECOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE AND CO-PROTECTING INDIGENOUS RESOURCE SOVEREIGNTY

Manoomin (Ojibwe/ Anishinaabe), or northern wild rice (Zizania palustris), is an annual aquatic grass that grows across the Great Lakes region. It has medicinal, spiritual and dietary significance to the sovereign Tribes of the region, but its abundance has been declining despite its legal protection under treaties. Standard practices in State and Federal environmental management involve non-Native scientists examining Indigenous lands to draw conclusions that drive resource extraction without input from Indigenous people. This method represents continued physical, economic, and intellectual colonization. In an attempt to subvert this paradigm, our project brings together representatives from a number of Tribes across this region -- including natural resource stewards, cultural leaders, elders, and rice chiefs -- as well as Native and non-Native students and researchers to protect manoomin. Over the past two years of collaboration and field work, our close partnership has brought forth scientific and relational insights that would not have emerged with standard western science approaches. Ongoing work between researchers and partners has yielded a multi-dimensional approach which seeks to capture the various forces influencing manoomin. In this conceptual approach, watershed changes, sediments, nutrient concentrations, hydrologic parameters, and competitive vegetation are assessed to examine the impact on the growth of manoomin while maintaining a genuine collaboration with project partners and treating manoomin with the utmost respect. While the threats to manoomin vary from site to site, the continued interactions of humans on these aquatic systems is clear above all. Our relationships with each other and this ecosystem are not only an integral part of our methods, but are also the emerging solution to holistic scientific inquiry and socio-environmental community health.