Camille T. Dungy, University Distinguished Professor of English at Colorado State University, joins Toward Inclusive Excellence Editor-in-Chief Alexia Hudson-Ward to discuss her latest book, Soil: The Story of a Black Mother’s Garden. An author of prose and poetry, Camille explains how she planned for the title to be a collection of nature poems, but while writing—crucially, in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic—she was instead inspired by her ongoing project to transform her yard into a space with diverse, native plants. Recounting the seven-year journey of her garden, Camille interweaves key environmental justice texts and nature writing to underscore the importance of diversifying both our gardens and environmental literature.

In the episode, Camille chats about the development of Soil and how the pandemic influenced her writing. Further, she highlights the drawbacks of cynical, doom-filled environmental writing that positions the natural world and human beings at odds. As Camille argues, this position prevents new members from joining the environmental movement, because “…a lot of people just assume that they have no place in the environmental movement because the environmental movement has no place for people.” In addition, Camille describes environmental justice as central to her writing and ethics, emphasizing social and environmental justice as one and the same. To close, she digs into her experiences with homeowners association (HOA) rules in her neighborhood and the complexity of her relationship with gardening and leisure as a Black woman.

Episode theme music: Black is the Night by Jeris (c) copyright 2014 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial (3.0) license. Ft: DJ Vadim (djvadim) , NiGiD

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