Land Ethics:

Integrating the past and present for

a sustainable future

Melissa Marshall- 810072282

Reflection 2: Land Ethics

EDFN 4000

11-13-14

“Twenty centuries of 'progress' have brought the

average citizen a vote, a national anthem, a Ford,

a bank account, and a high opinion of himself, but

not the capacity to live in high density without

befouling and denuding his environment, nor a

conviction that such capacity, rather than such

density, is the true test of whether he is

civilized. ~Aldo Leopold

Jeff Soto "Nightbomber," 2007

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Introduction:Ethics are a system of moral principles one adheres to

or strives toward. Ethical philosophies guide people’s daily existence. “Land ethic” is a philosophy of symbiotic relationship between humans and the land, where the human needs are not placed above the ecosystem and an integral relationship exists. Land ethics relates to this “manner of living that would not be easy” as espoused in the “People of the Corn” piece. Ethics are not always strictly adhered to, but one knows what is right according to their guiding ethics and works to be in alignment with these beliefs.

The predominance of the nature-culture divide’s most current incarnation, is a direct result of the industrial era and its remodeling of the American Dream. Where the American Dream of the past stood for the tenet of freedom, that all should be free to pursue their happiness and be released from oppression, today’s American Dream embodies materialistic and socially constructed imagery of the nuclear family with their car, green grass lawn, and the “house, with the white picket fence” (and the dog!). While these can symbolize many things for many people, the happiness and release from oppression is masked by the objects or situations industrialized society has come to relate with success. Industrialism and capitalism deeper embedded archetypes of materialism, hierarchy, and human separation from the land in the US collective unconscious. Examining the present day “American Dream” iconic representation described above, the domestication of nature and the human hierarchal relation to nature is apparent seeing the green weedless grass lawns and man as master of the beasts with his obedient dog, not to overlook the sanitary vision of the “home” and the human imposed fence boundary delineating separation of self and community.

The discourse of sustainability for both the human population and the rest of the land and inhabitants includes returning to smaller scale farming with less blind dependence on industrial machinery and more individuals working the land. Physically working the land is the most direct way to begin to re-foster the sense of interconnectedness and interdependence with the land.

There is an inherent connection between laboring with

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the land and strong land ethics, which is expressed through many farming cultures such as Hopi and Amish. Communities that experience the growing season and produce bounty from the land, receive tangible and continuous reminders of their dependence on the land. The physical labor expressed during harvest as the produce that sustains the community, instills respect and reverence for the land and strengthens the human-nature bond. Following examples of some subsistence farming communities, we can come to develop a sense of the ways we can strengthen our mutualistic bonds with the land and evolve our personal land ethics.

A.M. Maurice “The Magic Orange Tree” (1950’s-2000)

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“Look at the past to find the answers”

~Jesus Garcia

Mexican farmers in TucsonJesus Garcia speaks of the "Sonoran supermarket"

referring to the plants growing on the land, and to the fruit grown on the local land as the "same fruit our ancestors eat." families still cultivate fruit trees as a way of life with often 8-10 variety of heirloom fruit trees. He experiences historic ties to the land connecting the lineage in circularity instead of linearity with his family and back through ancestry, reaching back into the native Mexican inhabitation of the area.

Garcia highlights the difference in the way the Mexican farmers identified the quince from the scientists trying to study the local fruit. The people growing the fruit could not precisely identify the strains of quince. The locals knew them in relation to their harvest "quince that ripens in October,” not having names for quince besides when the quince ripens is in opposition with Cartesian methodology which uses taxonomy and names everything. Scientists struggled to identify the fruits in tradition taxonomy.

The scientists attempt to file the quince trees into western scientific taxa imposing outside influences, instead of seeking to understand the quince in relation to its ecosystem. Naming can be perceived as a symbol of conquest (thinking in relation to naming and taking of lands as well) It is thought that naming changes the energy of that which is named. A lot of new species are named in the appellation of the individual who "discovered" it/them, which is in direct connection with the power over structures of modern man.

Some of the people farming the region are direct lineage from original settlement of southern border areas. Navaho and Hopi still cultivating missionary fruit trees as well, using seeds that come from heirloom seeds of centuries passed, linking cultural memory of moral significance in relation to the trees. The farming continues the legacy of

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the community and land and maintains a sense of place. The people are literally embodying the same space, cultivating the same fruit as their ancestors and directly passing knowledge from one generation to the next including the goods crafted from the land such as the rope, from natural materials (horsehair). The mutualistic relationship is evident while the community aspect is implied.

Upper Rio Grande of Southern Colorado Acequias FarmersAcequias require the connection to the land, uniting

land and family history as the laborers dig the same ditches the previous generations unearthed. In this way we again uncover the aspect to land ethics, direct passing of knowledge. In the example of the Colorado acequias farmers, the community aspect comes to the forefront, as the acequias require community effort to maintain the flow of water. The acequias farmers of Southern Colorado use a network of irrigation canals to divert water to crops. The "tenure of the waters and works was communal, or municipal" (Pena) and the communities of the area are "irrigating municipalities,"(Pena) with the establishment of local self-governance by basin instead of by political border.

The idea of imposition resurfaces in the politics of mapping regions. For the acequias farmers, their locality is governed by water. The water basin has a connection to the land and land usage and the farmers think of the boundaries in this way. The political boundaries become “arbitrary lines” that do not denote places of cultural geography (instead political agendas), becoming artificial boundaries such as "borders" between the US and Mexico, and the fence between Stapleton neighborhood and Aurora. Acequias operate to integrate the system, not separate, as industrial agriculture methodology requires. The land sharing water through leakage creates diversity corridors; this reduces erosion as well as increases the local biota.

Symbiotic evolutionary relationship occurs in these places, where "agroecological system would not have been possible without the influence of humans.”(Pena) Nature and culture are not separate here.

If one person or an area does not choose to clean their area of the acequia, more sediment will be carried in the

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water, different deposition patterns will occur, and the reliability of the acequia will be compromised. This exemplifies “the commons.” If the watershed is exploited it cannot support the farming community on the whole. The acequias are a model of mutual support as well as a production model converse to consumption model.

The Hopi, in “People of the corn,” live this model as well, with "farming central to the identities of the communities" (Wall and Masayevsa) This is indicative of the metaphor of the corn as sustenance, the mother and the tradition of placing an ear of corn with an infant, boding the child with mother nature. The Hopi bond with the land as a first ritual/rite of passage into life. The personification illustrates the lack of separation with nature and acknowledgement of the dependence of humans on the land for survival. The relationship built between the Hopi and nature from the beginning of life is another way to explore possibilities of models to interact with the land.

Amish FarmersThe Amish Farming community also holds strong land ethics. Work and leisure for the community are relatively the same.The physical labor is expressed in an acetic way as the rest of the examples show in different ways. Expressed in the Amish example are the aesthetic pleasures of diversified farming with its variety, colors, textures, changing sensate experience, and element of unknown. One knows generally what to expect but all plants are unique expressions and every season single.

Community makes the Amish farming life possible and they do not feel like working the land is an obligation, it is a positive experience. This is contrary to the industrial farming complex and today’s socially constructed vision of manual labor. As in the previous communities families working the same land, but more so it is explained in the Amish piece that even though families have their own land to work, they also work land as a wider community, and used shared technology such as farming equipment; it is the sense of cooperatives.

Amish land ethics include respect and support for

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natural environment and animals and a sensitivity to the changing land, "feeling part of the whole" while tilling the land. Standing out was the Amish farmer noticing the erosion on a farm in Iowa.

As with others, the Amish experience the outsider trying to impose “help.” The story of the person (from outside the community and culture) telling them to do no till farming, was indicative of the way modern culture treats people who live more simply and close to the land (further from the immediate influence of industrial technology).Again, an outsider perspective attempting to control a level of the community evolution, but the farmers have been working the land for generations and are familiar, having a healthy functioning relationship with the land. Black and white perspectives do not serve as well as understanding of nuances by people with a long history of mutualistic relationship with the land they inhabit.

Conclusion:Difficulties contributing to weak land ethics are

multitudinous. Reframing human perspective is a paradigm shift. Nature and culture can again be nature-culture as we move to a wider re-adoption of land ethics within the majority. Both human and nature are inseparable and mutually coevolve. Living sustainability requires a more consciously land-based identity, as everything we create and consume is terrestrial. Humans are inherently connected to the land; therefore denying this interdependence deludes and distorts the human perspective of the earth ecology.

A portion of land ethics also considers the aspect of naming. Reconsidering our Cartesian methodologies may be an important piece of reviving our acknowledgement of existing as a part of the cycle. Reflecting on the examples of the farming communities, this stands out as a difference.

Utilization of beneficial disturbance ecology exemplified by the acequias farming community, is a way to immediately change models of farming that consume more than produce. Communities with strong land ethics show that small area farming can feed a population, be maintained without precision agricultural techniques, and make a positive

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impact on the surrounding environment. The obligations of large area (industrial) farming lends to poorer land ethics, as fear for survival is greater with higher overhead.

There is a need to have preservation and conservation efforts until the mainstream consciousness clarifies and rebuilds the connection to the land and integrates strong land ethics, as there is a significant enough portion of mainstream society that are enough removed from the land and connection with its importance that without constricting their exploitation and direct disrespect of the land, many negative environmental impacts would result. To avoid the positive feedback cycles contributing to the “tragedy of the commons,” strong collective land ethics will develop out of necessity and pressure on the human population.

References:

Cowan, D. (2013) “Tasting History” Documentary, Vimeo,

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retrieved 10/28/14 from https://vimeo.com/52716148

Galindo, R. PhD Professor at the University of Colorado, Denver, EDFN 4000: Food Justice Class Discussions (9/2014-11/2014)

Kline, D. (1990) “Great Possessions: An Amish Farmer’s Journal” North Point Press, San Francisco

Kotutwa Johnson, M. (2014) Professor Rene Galindo, PhD, EDFN 4000, Slides from class discussion 11/4/2014

Pena, D. (1998) “Cultural Landscapes and Biodiversity: The Ethnoecology of an Upper Rio Grande Watershed Commons,” La Gente: Hispano History and Life in Colorado, Colorado Historical Society

Soto, J. (2007) "Nightbomber" retrieved on 11/12/14 from http://www.jeffsoto.com/art2007Nightbomber.htm

Tortorello, M. “In the Garden: The seeds of an Era Long Gone” New York Times: Home and Garden, November 21, 2012

Wall and Masayevsa “People of the Corn: Teachings in Hopi Traditional Agriculture, Spirituality, and Sustainability,” American Indian Quarterly, Summer & Fall 2004, Vol. 28, No 3&4

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