Episode 004 - Dr. Daniela Shebitz on Traditional Land Management and Nature Connection

This episode is with Dr. Daniela Shebitz, an awesomely engaged and inspiring young professor at Kean University in New Jersey. Daniela is a plant ecologist who researches the effects of land management on culturally significant plant species and ecosystems. She is inspired by traditions that have lasted for millennia based on traditional management through anthropogenic fire and selective harvesting. I love the way Daniela braids together ethnobotany, ecology, anthropology, and restoration. In this conversation, we talk about Daniela's research with Robin Kimmerer on Sweetgrass, about "traditional land management" and "traditional ecological knowledge" in the Northeast and in Costa Rica, about monocrop agriculture and alternatives found in traditional cultures, and about urban people finding nature connection.