The Serviceberry

Starred review from October 1, 2024
While picking serviceberries among singing birds doing the same, Kimmerer, a Potawatomi botanist, professor, MacArthur fellow, and writer renowned for Braiding Sweetgrass (2013), envisions a new take on a traditional way of living in sync with nature. Serviceberries, she explains, sustain numerous animals and insects and have long been prized by Indigenous people for being delicious, nourishing, and medicinally beneficial. When her farmer neighbors invite people to pick their serviceberry harvest for free, Kimmerer found herself musing over how the Anishinaabe people are guided by gratitude and respect for nature's sustaining abundance and reciprocity. In a "gift economy" based on sharing "the sustenance that the land provides," and in which "all flourishing is mutual," there would be "no such thing as waste." Gracefully elucidating these resonant concepts, Kimmerer contrasts the imperative to share and an abiding respect for nature with our economy's harsh focus on commodification, scarcity, and competition. She writes about how using ""the living world" as a model for "human ways of living" could decrease economic inequity and environmental destruction. Accompanied by John Burgoyne's vibrant line drawings, Kimmerer's deeply rooted, wise, and inspiring reflections coalesce into a fresh approach to connecting ecology, economics, and ethics, beginning with achievable grassroots endeavors in the hope of gradually widening the circle.

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September 23, 2024
“All flourishing is mutual,” according to this rousing treatise on the benefits of communal values. Potawatomi environmentalist Kimmerer (Braiding Sweetgrass) explains that the Potawatomi root word for “berry” (min) is also the root word for “gift,” illustrating how in the tribe’s “culture of gratitude,” natural resources are seen as offerings that carry with them “responsibilities of sharing, respect, reciprocity.” Such principles are needed to counter the concentration of resources in the hands of the few, she contends, calling for “gift economies” in which “the practice for dealing with abundance is to give it away.” By way of example, she discusses how Native peoples of the Pacific Northwest mark life milestones with celebratory potlatches at which individuals “enhance their prestige and affirm connections with a web of relations” by giving away possessions. Kimmerer is clear-eyed about the challenges of transitioning to a gift economy, acknowledging that it’s susceptible to bad actors and will require a drastic change in mindset. However, she observes that modern examples of successful gift economies abound, from public libraries to open-source software and Wikipedia. Kimmerer doesn’t attempt to outline a practical plan for vanquishing self-centeredness borne of capitalism, but she nonetheless succeeds in bringing attention to the fact that alternatives are possible. It’s an eloquent call to action. Illus. Agent: Sarah Levitt, Aevitas Creative Management.

November 1, 2024
Learning from the land. Kimmerer, drawing from her Potawatomi heritage, uses the abundant serviceberry to demonstrate the gifts that the natural world provides, highlighting the "enoughness" of these gifts if we choose to view them as such. For a society consumed by consumption, this portrait is startling in its simplicity. "Recognizing 'enoughness' is a radical act in an economy that is always urging us to consume more," Kimmerer writes. While the prose occasionally verges on saccharine, each word is clearly chosen with care and deliberation, resulting in a masterful reflection on ecology and culture. The book seamlessly blends science, inherited wisdom, and philosophy, urging readers to reconsider their relationship with the environment and society. Kimmerer pushes back against the individualism and scarcity mindsets entrenched in our interactions, encouraging us to draw inspiration from the natural world and Indigenous knowledge systems. Rather than the exploitative system of modern capitalism, which can be damaging to both the earth and our relationships, Kimmerer invites readers to envision a life that embraces the gift economy--one built on reciprocity, collective well-being, and care. She writes, "When we speak of [sustenance provided from the land] not as things or natural resources or commodities, but as gifts, our whole relationship to the natural world changes." Despite the dire repercussions of not living in harmony with nature, her beautiful and hopeful prose leaves readers feeling sated, galvanized, and keenly aware of the world around them. A welcome meditation on living in harmony with the earth and fostering deeper connections with one another.

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December 20, 2024

Kimmerer, an enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation and author of the bestselling Braiding Sweetgrass, offers lessons and inspiration from Indigenous wisdom and the plant world as she considers the serviceberry, which embodies reciprocity, interconnectedness, and gratitude. She posits that the serviceberry symbolizes a better way to live, in contrast to an economy based on scarcity, competition, and hoarding of resources. Prepub Alert.

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