Celebrating Indigenous People’s Day with Weshoyot Alvitre’s “Brave” and words from Robin Wall Kimmerer

CA map of indigenous peoples

“The land knows you, even when you are lost,” writes Robin Wall Kimmerer in Braiding Sweetgrass (36). “The land is the real teacher. All we need as students is mindfulness. Paying attention is a form of reciprocity with the living world,” advises Kimmerer (222).  These are two of my favorite quotes from Braiding Sweetgrass written by Kimmerer, an enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, and a university professor.

Do you know the land where you live? Do you know who lived where you do before you did? I do: I know many of the plants and animals that live here, and I know I live on Chumash land, a community called Shishilop. Thousands of Chumash lived on this sliver of earth between the hills and the Pacific Ocean, between the Ventura and the Santa Clara Rivers where so much water flowed it created mudflats, and the Chumash who lived here were known as “mud people.” Another 10,000 or so people lived near what’s now known as Port Hueneme, near Malibu.

Late September each year, around the time of the fall equinox, the Chumash held a harvest festival to honor Hutash, Earth Mother. On the hill above Shishilop, they gathered for five days in ceremony paying homage to ancestors, where they left shell money, pine nuts, and they would start the new year in the sycamores. Read more here.

Weshoyot Alvitre

Why do I share this? Now? Because today is Indigenous People’s Day and I want to recognize it by drawing attention to local Ventura County native American artist and writer Weshoyot Alvitre.

Brave by Weshoyot Alvitre

Last spring, Weshoyot Alvitre and I went for a walk in the Ventura hills to talk about her life and her new book “Brave” released April 15! Weshoyot is a prolific, accomplished, and wide ranging artist — from comic books to museum shows to award winning children’s books to fiber artist and so much more. “Brave” is  her debut children’s book where she’s both author and illustrator, but for years she been an award winning artist.

Weshoyot Alvitre

I’ve known Weshoyot for over 6 years — we were even neighbors for a time (and before that I was neighbors with her sister Winona!) So I was really happy the VC Reporter was interested in a story about Weshoyot and her new, beautiful book. Check it out!

Here’s the link to the article I wrote about Weshoyot and her new book. 

Weshoyot’s been involved with a number of children’s books including the award winning “At The Mountain’s Base” which was recognized today by Reading Rainbow:

award winning children’s book illustrated by Weshoyot Alvitre

This semester I am once again doing Book Clubs with my Ventura College students, and one of the choices is Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass. Students often choose the book after reading an excerpt “Council of Pecans.”

I look forward to their discoveries!

Kimmerer