An Evening with Robin Wall Kimmerer

Robin Wall Kimmerer is a mother, scientist, decorated professor, and enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation. She is the author of Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants, which has earned Kimmerer wide acclaim. Her first book, Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses, was awarded the John Burroughs Medal for outstanding nature writing, and her other work has appeared in Orion, Whole Terrain, and numerous scientific journals. In 2022, Braiding Sweetgrass was adapted for young adults by Monique Gray Smith. This new edition reinforces how wider ecological understanding stems from listening to the earth’s oldest teachers: the plants around us. Kimmerer’s newest book, The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World (November 2024), is a bold and inspiring vision for how to orient our lives around gratitude, reciprocity, and community, based on the lessons of the natural world.

She tours widely and has been featured on NPR’s On Being with Krista Tippett and in 2015 addressed the general assembly of the United Nations on the topic of “Healing Our Relationship with Nature.” Kimmerer is a SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor of Environmental Biology, and the founder and director of the Center for Native Peoples and the Environment, whose mission is to create programs which draw on the wisdom of both Indigenous and scientific knowledge for our shared goals of sustainability. In 2022 she was named a MacArthur Fellow.

As a writer and a scientist, her interests in restoration include not only restoration of ecological communities, but restoration of our relationships to land. She holds a BS in Botany from SUNY ESF, an MS and PhD in Botany from the University of Wisconsin and is the author of numerous scientific papers on plant ecology, bryophyte ecology, traditional knowledge and restoration ecology. As a writer and a scientist, her interests in restoration include not only restoration of ecological communities, but restoration of our relationships to land. She lives on an old farm in upstate New York, tending gardens both cultivated and wild.

Leslie Jonas is a native Cape Codder and Elder Eel Clan member of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe. She holds a BA in Mass Communications & Television Production from Emerson College, an MS in Community Economic Development, and is certified in DEI from Cornell University. Leslie is an experienced planning and development strategist with a demonstrated history of working in media, higher education, tribal governments, and non-profits. In almost every role she has served, her work has centered on environmental activism, Indigenous land and water conservation, climate change adaptation, cultural preservation of lifeways, and environmental justice. As a founding board officer, Leslie has spent the past 13 years helping to build the first Native-led land conservation trust east of the Mississippi, the Native Land Conservancy (NLC). She has served as clerk, treasurer, and vice-chairwoman over the 13 years and is the current treasurer. 

For many years, Leslie has been researching and focusing on climate change from the Indigenous perspective and produces and directs educational video tools, such as a “Connecting with the Natural Elements” video series on Earth, Water, Air, and Fire, and a “Climate Change – Indigenous Voices” video for audiences across many disciplines. For the past five years and currently, Leslie co-teaches and advises an Indigenous Environmental Planning course in the Department of Urban Studies & Planning at MIT, speaking publicly on climate change, re-wilding, cultural respect, traditional ecological knowledge, cultural burning, environmental justice and environmental self-determination. She was an Indigenous advisory board member for the state of MA Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) from 2020-2024, sits on the state’s Justice40 advisory board, and is the first Mashpee Wampanoag to sit on the Cape Cod National Seashore advisory commission under the former Interior Secretary, Deb Haaland. She is also a Keystone Cooperator on Cape Cod, trained in advising homeowners and municipalities on Forestry management. 

Leslie holds a significant role as a research administrator and the first-ever Tribal Liaison for the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) on Cape Cod. In these two capacities, she is crucial in providing Indigenous relationality and programmatic support to leading scientists, enabling them to implement their research work supporting our oceans and coastal communities. Her close collaboration with the Institution’s Chief DEI Officer on building a stronger relationship with the Wampanoag Nation and other northern Turtle Island Tribes is a testament to her dedication to fostering meaningful connections and promoting equitable and just environmental conservation. Currently, Leslie is MIT’s Martin Luther King Visiting Scholar/Professor in Anthropology, and will teach a class in Indigenous studies in the Fall of 2025 and 2026. 

Leslie brings incredible enthusiasm and dedication to each and every one of her projects.