Medicine Feet
adapted from Master's Dissertation
by Frank Cook
"As the Empire building of predatory capitalism begins to
crumble beneath the weight of its excesses, and many First
Nations people disappear or become radically changed before the
ongoing forces of colonization, we find the world awash in
cultural fragments and detritus. It is out of this broth of identity
nutrients, this compost heap of social possibilities, that an archetype of human renewal is arising. I call this the 'sylva' (of the forest, and in its expanded sense, Nature) 'politan' (citizen of). The sylvapolitan is a bridge figure, alchemizing balance, and often synthesis, between the colonizers and colonized; the techno-rational mind of modernity and perennial wisdoms; reason (eagle) and spirit (condor), male and female knowledges. The sylvapolitan represents our potential to survive this era of great extinctions, to act as co-creative partners with the great Evolutionary intelligences of the planet, and flourish as a species."
- anthropologist, Morgan Brent
With the complex of issues around peak oil and climate change all coinciding upon us, the reality is unsettling that medicine for most westerners is synthetic produced in some far away factory. This points us towards the vulnerability of a very important aspect of living, our health. Even those who use natural medicines still purchase most of those medicines. Educating ourselves about these issues brings upon us the awareness that how far a food or medicine travels is essential. Those consciously aware people (of whom I imagine you count yourself among) already have been counting their food miles and their ecological footprints, but Rob Hopkins, founder of the Transition Culture Movement, warns us to start counting food feet. How many feet are your foods traveling? The same can be asked of our medicine. We need to count our Medicine Feet!...