Urban Eco-Narratives

The MSP LTER is grounded in collaboration to deliver on its mission to “study how urban stressors affect the ecological structure and functioning of urban nature, including pollinators, urban forests, urban watersheds, and lakes and streams.” We are fortunate to partner with myriad researchers and community partners from across the MSP area—from colleges and universities to NGOs, governmental institutions to community organizations. In the piece below, Nancy Cook discusses one of the MSP LTER collaborative efforts around storytelling, community, and urban ecology.

The MSP LTER, YO MAMA!, and the Witness Project, are engaged in a collaborative effort to co-produce literary narratives focused on ecological/environmental issues within an urban context. The project is designed to make science more meaningful to the community, to make scientists more aware of community perspectives, and to inspire writers to use their skills in service to the community. It builds on a recognition that people develop different ways of seeing, listening, and interpreting in their work. Through sharing their unique “witnessing” and “researching” processes, scientists and artists are discovering how to incorporate these other ways of knowing into their respective practices for the benefit of all.

 

Literary artists are supporting the scientific community’s professional development by providing MSP LTER graduate students, postdocs, faculty, and other researchers in the sciences with insights on diverse “eco-narrative” techniques, including poetry and storytelling. In turn, MSP LTER scientists are educating the literary artists about ecological relationships between humans and nature in cities and how urban stressors—such as climate change, pollutants, invasive species, and habitat fragmentation—affect the ecological structure and functioning of urban nature.

Participants in the new collaborative—nine scientists and nine writers—are working in teams loosely focused on themes that include tree canopy and preservation policies, native lands restoration, water and soil management, and urban development impact. Following an initial organizational meeting in the fall, all participants have gathered twice to explore storytelling, poetry, and eco-narrative techniques. Small groups have embarked on field trips to Bassett Creek, Wakaŋ Tipi/Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary, and Northside neighborhoods. Teams expect to do much more field research over the summer months. Meanwhile dozens of readings—poems, essays, articles, and other materials found to be motivating and relevant to the collaborative’s work together—have been exchanged. Participants are beginning to write their own poems and essays, as well.

 

A reading of works is scheduled for August 20 at Cedar Lake East Beach.

 

In the coming months, the collaborative will also deliver a “Collaborators Handbook.” The handbook will contain, among other things, strategies for scientists on how to approach material from a storytelling perspective, as well as incorporate emotional and other intangible facts and evidence into their work. For non-scientists, the handbook will contain strategies on how to perceive what is hidden in nature and incorporate other-than-human perspectives into their work. The handbook will also contain multiple prompts to inspire students of both the literary arts and the sciences to create accessible narratives on urban environmental justice. A wide range of poetry, essays, and stories composed by participants will serve as examples of such writing. In addition, the collaborative intends to develop a set of action priorities and concrete next steps that will ensure this network of scientists, literary artists, and community allies will have continuing life.

 

As partners in this initiative, the MSP LTER, YO MAMA!, and The Witness Project all share histories of community engagement in environmental concerns and an appreciation for the value of sharing experience through a literary lens: