Cornelia F. Mutel, an ecologist by training, has written nature and environmental books for nearly a half century. Over time, she has increasingly used first-person stories and other creative writing techniques to draw her reading audience more deeply into her subject matter. Her 2016 book, A Sugar Creek Chronicle: Observing Climate Change from a Midwestern Woodland, greatly amplified these techniques, as did Tending Iowa&#39;s Land: Pathways to a Sustainable Future, a 2022 edited compendium of Iowa&#39;s environmental challenges and their solutions. She claims that creative writing techniques better communicate important material and simultaneously make her books more fun to read and write. Connie, a plant ecologist by training, was until retirement a Senior Science Writer at the University of Iowa’s broad-based IIHR-Hydroscience & Engineering Institute. She lives with her husband in an oak woodland north of Iowa City, which they are restoring to its pre-settlement diversity and health. _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ⁠ecotheatrelab.com⁠ for links to Connie&#39;s work and how to connect with her, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this ⁠brief feedback form⁠ (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

The Art of Climate Dialogue: Stories from Iowa

Stories Generating Hope Generating Action: Cornelia F. Mutel

Alice McGary is a farmer, fiddler, potter, weaver, quilter, mentor, and community facilitator. She&#39;s excited about beauty, justice, community, and being outside. She lives and works at the Mustard Seed Community Farm, which is an 11-acre diversified, cooperative farm in northeastern Boone county, near the Ioway Creek. From Alice: "Many have lived on this land before us, including the Ioway and Meskwaki people, and the plants and creatures of the tall-grass prairie and savanna - all of whom live more cooperatively and gracefully on the land of this region, and all of whom have been forcibly pushed into much tinier territories, to the great detriment of Iowa and our world. Here on the farm, I&#39;ve been on a journey of trying to learn how to be a better community member of our ecosystem and our planet. I&#39;ve been learning a lot - from the wisdom of my elders and peers and from many mistakes and I still have so much to learn!" _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ⁠ecotheatrelab.com⁠ for links to Alice&#39;s work and how to connect with her, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this ⁠brief feedback form⁠ (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants Lane Larson - Sound Technician

Creating Spaces Where We Invite, Imagine, Empower: Alice McGary

Shelley Buffalo lives on the Meskwaki Settlement with her two sons. The Meskwaki Settlement is Shelley’s home and community. She says: “Wherever I may wander, my path winds back home to my community along the Iowa River. I’m drawn back again and again because this is where I belong and who I belong to. The Meskwaki culture formed me into who I am today. Some of that formation was harsh and some was loving. I may be middle aged now, yet I am still a child when it comes to my cultural education. Yet if there is one thing that I can do in my lifetime that is meaningful, it is to interrupt colonization by staying committed to my own Meskwaki cultural development. Everything I do and say is measured by what my elders have taught and continue to teach me.” The Meskwaki are unique in that their land based community is a settlement, not a reservation. Established in 1857 with the purchase of 80 acres near Tama, Iowa, the Meskwaki Settlement has grown to over 8,600 acres.  Learn more about the Meskwaki at www.meskwaki.org. _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ⁠ecotheatrelab.com⁠ for links to Shelley&#39;s work and how to connect with her, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this ⁠brief feedback form⁠ (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

Amplifying Narratives of Connection: Shelley Buffalo

Mary Swander, an Iowa Women’s Hall of Fame 2022 honoree, is the Artistic Director of Swander Woman Productions, a theatre troupe that performs dramas about food, farming, and the wider rural environment. She tours her dramas, including The Girls on the Roof, Vang, Map of my Kingdom, and Farm-to-Fork Tales, from coast-to-coast and gives solo performances of her own work, playing the banjo, the harmonica and the spoons. Her most recent play, Squatters on Red Earth, about the white settler land grab from the Native Americans, will go on the road in summer, 2023.  She is also the Executive Director of AgArts, a nonprofit designed to imagine and promote healthy food systems through the arts.  The former Poet Laureate of Iowa, Swander is an award-winning author and has published scores of books of poetry and nonfiction as well as essays, magazine articles, individual poems and radio commentaries in such places as National Public Radio, The Nation, The New York Times Magazine, and Poetry Magazine. She is a member of the Iowa Writers Collaborative, founded Blazing Star Literary Journal and recently began a podcast, AgArts in Horse and Buggy Land. Swander taught creative writing for thirty years at Iowa State University, and she now gives workshops on poetry, nonfiction and playwriting, as well as farmland transition, for other colleges and universities and nonprofit organizations. In Kalona, Iowa (Kickapoo territory), Swander lives in an old Amish one-room schoolhouse, raises goats and has a large organic garden where she grows most of her own food.  _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ecotheatrelab.com for links to Mary&#39;s work and how to connect with her, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this brief feedback form (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

Stories Beget Stories: Mary Swander

Tamara Marcus currently serves as the Linn County Sustainability Director. Previously, they were a Fulbright scholar where they completed two years of climate change research in the Indian Himalaya, working with local communities to translate her physical science research into local conservation policy. Tamara is a Ph.D. candidate in the Natural Resources and Earth System Sciences Ph.D. program at the University of New Hampshire. Her research interests include using bioinformatic techniques to understand the impact of warming on microbial mediation of carbon emissions from Arctic lakes. Additionally, she studies how indigenous communities access weather and climate data to better understand how to make results from climate research more accessible and applicable to individuals and communities. Using a combination of survey data and storytelling, Marcus works with Sami communities and indigenous Australians to record environmental change observed by the traditional owners of the land. Through this work, Marcus hopes to promote collaborative development of conservation policy by both scientists and indigenous communities. Ms. Marcus has been a Switzer fellow, a NASA New Hampshire Space Grant fellow, and a National Center for Atmospheric Research fellow and completed her B.S. in biochemistry and English from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. From Tamara: "I would like to acknowledge the tribal communities and land of Abeskovvu, Sampi, the location where I am honored to be able work and connect." _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ⁠ecotheatrelab.com⁠ for links to Tamara&#39;s work and how to connect with them, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this ⁠brief feedback form⁠ (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

Invite Stories, Build Relationships, Catalyze Change: Tamara Marcus

Jean Eells operates E Resources Group, LLC from Webster City Iowa. She grew up on an Iowa farm where there were no cockleburs. She conducts research and conservation programs with Women, Food and Agriculture Network and other partners. Stephanie Enloe is the Director of Programming for the Women Food and Agriculture Network (WFAN) and a PhD candidate at Cornell University. She recently returned to her home state of Iowa after living for several years in Ithaca, NY. In her role as a graduate student, Stephanie works with a Malawian farming organization called Soils, Food and Healthy Communities (SFHC) to support their ongoing efforts to advance agroecology. She brings her interests in sustainable food systems, social justice, and participatory learning models to her work coordinating WFAN’s Women Caring for the Land and Harvesting Our Potential programs. Linda Shenk is an Associate Professor of English at Iowa State University. In her research, she applies her background in storytelling and performance to how researchers and community members can co-create narratives that foster relationship building, action, and resilience. She teaches courses that bring together Shakespeare, Climate Change Theatre Action, community empowerment, and science communication. From the Women, Food and Agriculture Network: ​As an agricultural and majority-white organization, WFAN recognizes that the US food system grew out of Indigenous genocide, the enslaved labor of African Americans, and the continuous exploitation of BIPOC. The control of land -- and the food growing upon it -- have long been weapons of white supremacy and colonialism. Our work in Iowa takes place on the homelands of several Indigenous nations, including the Báxoje, Meskwaki, and Sauk. _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ⁠ecotheatrelab.com⁠ for links to Jean, Stephanie, and Linda&#39;s work and how to connect with them and the Women, Food and Agriculture Network; the transcript for this episode; and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this ⁠brief feedback form⁠ (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

Micro-Stories Leading to Climate Action: Jean Eells, Stephanie Enloe, and Linda Shenk

Angie Carter is a writer, organizer, and sociologist whose work focuses on rural communities, agriculture, and movements for ecological and food justice. Originally from the land between two rivers, or what is now known as Iowa, she continues to remain engaged in the movements for ecological justice in the heart of what is now the commodified agricultural system. She currently lives in a very different watershed today – Lake Superior – where she works at Michigan Technological University as an associate professor in the Department of Social Sciences on Michigan’s Keweenaw Peninsula. She also serves as co-president of the Women, Food and Agriculture board and on the Western Upper Peninsula’s Food Systems Collaborative’s planning team. Angie Carter has lived the majority of her life and continues to find much inspiration for her scholarly and creative work from the lands and waters known today as Iowa, taken through theft and false treaties by the US federal government from the Ioway, Meskwaki, and Sauk nations in 1838 and 1842. These lands and waters provided historic and seasonal homelands and hunting grounds for the Oceti Sakowin, Winnebago, Potawatomi, Ponca, Ottawa peoples, among others. Today, the Sac and Fox Tribe of the Mississippi in Iowa, or the Meskwaki Nation, own a settlement in central Iowa, the Omaha and Winnebago nations own lands in western Iowa and, in 2022, 7 acres in Johnson County, IA became the first lands formerly returned to the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska. Today, Angie lives along Lake Superior, on the ancestral and contemporary homelands of the Anishinaabe, ceded to the US through the Treaty of La Pointe in 1842 and now known as the western part of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and northern Wisconsin. She is indebted to those who have cared for, since time immemorial, the lands and waters she knows as her childhood and adulthood homes. She works to unlearn colonial relations within human and more-than-human communities through her professional and personal lives. _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ecotheatrelab.com for links to Angie&#39;s work and how to connect with her, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this brief feedback form (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

Sharing Personal Narratives, Reshaping Societal Narratives: Angie Carter

Lance M. Foster (Irogre: Finds What is Sought, Bear Clan), b. 1960, is a member of the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska, of the Ioway Nation. Raised in Montana, he received a B.A. in Anthropology and Native American studies from University of Montana as well as an M.A. in Anthropology and an M.L.A. in Landscape Architecture from Iowa State University. He’s an alumnus of the Institute of American Indian Arts. He was the Director of the Native Rights, Land and Culture division of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, a Historical Landscape Architect for the National Park Service, and an archaeologist for the U.S. Forest Service. He taught at the University of Montana -Helena College of Technology. Lance currently serves his tribe as THPO (Tribal Historic Preservation Officer), consulting for the tribe on environmental and cultural compliance, founded the tribal museum, is an Ioway language advocate, and NAGPRA officer. He serves on the Indian Advisory Council of Iowa’s Office of the State Archaeologist. He is the author of The Indians of Iowa (University of Iowa Press, 2009), and has appeared in the documentaries America’s Lost Landscape: The Tallgrass Prairie (2006), Lost Nation: The Ioway series (2007, 2013), and Life Before Fairfield (2017). An artist and educator, he resides with his wife in White Cloud, Kansas. He was elected Vice Chairman of the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska in the fall of 2019. He led the effort in establishing Ioway Tribal National Park (Baxoje Mowotanani) in Kansas-Nebraska and the return of our tribal boarding school, the Presbyterian Mission in Kansas, both of which were achieved. He is on the board of NATHPO as Southern Plains member, and on the board of the Nebraska Chapter of The Nature Conservancy. _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ecotheatrelab.com for links to Lance&#39;s work and how to connect with him, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this brief feedback form (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

Artists as Honest Witnesses: Lance Foster

Moselle Nita Singh is an artist of Punjabi descent with a background in agroecology and biodiversity regeneration. She has a Bachelor of Arts in cultural anthropology and a Master of Science in ethnobotany. Moselle has worked at various nonprofit organizations, biodiversity initiatives, and small organic farms across the Midwest, as well as Nicaragua and India. Growing up, she often turned to the more-than-human world to foster a sense of belonging. Experiencing the effects of industrial farming catalyzed her activism, as well as her interest in the ways in which we celebrate, honor, and defend our relationship with life through grassroots organizing, seed saving, and art. In the fall of 2020, she turned towards art as her primary mode of exploration, expression, healing, and activism. Moselle grew up in a rural area on the west side of the Mississippi River, the ancestral lands of predominantly Sauk & Meskwaki nations, which overlaps with lands of the Peoria, Sioux, and Kickapoo nations. Much of her art activism has been localized to "Iowa", which is largely Ioway, Sioux, Sauk & Meskwaki lands, and she currently lives near Lake Monona, which is predominantly Ho-Chunk territory and overlaps with Sioux, Sauk & Fox territories.  _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ⁠ecotheatrelab.com⁠ for links to Moselle&#39;s work and how to connect with her, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this ⁠brief feedback form⁠ (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

Celebration as a Mechanism for Resistance: Moselle Nita Singh

Sikowis (Christine Nobiss) is Plains Cree/Saulteaux of the George Gordon First Nation in Saskatchewan, Canada and grew up in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. At 19 she began her life&#39;s work of uplifting Indigenous voices when she got her first job at the New Brunswick Aboriginal Peoples Council in Fredericton, Canada. In 2015, she founded Great Plains Action Society as a way to increase Indigenous solidarity in Iowa City. It turned into a full-fledged organization during the fight against the Dakota Access Pipeline, which led her to start Little Creek Camp in February 2017. From August 2017 to September 2020, she worked for Seeding Sovereignty where she organized at a national level. As her heart is with her people and the prairies, Sikowis returned to Great Plains Action Society where she can work at a grassroots level and a fully Indigenous-led organization. Sikowis is also a speaker, writer, and artist. She believes that environmental and social justice work are inextricably linked and change will only happen when we dismantle corrupt colonial-capitalist systems and rebuild them with a decolonized worldview. She graduated from the University of Iowa in 2008 with a Masters Degree in Religious Studies (with a focus on Native American Religion and Culture) and a Graduate Minor in American Indian Native Studies. She fights for a better future for her two young children. _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ecotheatrelab.com for links to Sikowis&#39; work and how to connect with her, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this brief feedback form (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

Art as Culture, Resistance, and Community: Sikowis Nobiss

DeAn Kelly, also known as DK Just Human, is a Hiphop influencer and mentor. He is committed to producing positive Hiphop music and has 5 years of experience in community engagement, performance, and hosting workshops and events. DK is from Des Moines, Iowa and is here to inspire through the arts. DK has engaged in work in Des Moines and Osceola, Iowa, the ancestral lands of the Báxoǰe or Ioway, Sauk, and Meskwaki;  the New Jersey Great Pine Barrens, the ancestral lands of the Lenape; and Arizona on the ancestral lands of the Navajo Nation.   _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ecotheatrelab.com for links to DK&#39;s work and how to connect with him, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this brief feedback form (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants Louie Jordan - Sound Technician

Rehearsing the Language of Climate Action: DK (DeAn Kelly)

Ruth Rabinowitz was born in Michigan, raised in Arizona, and has lived for over 30 years in the Bay Area of California. Ruth designed a farmhouse and is now living on her land  in Southern Iowa. Ruth holds a BA in Art from University of California Santa Cruz, an Early Childhood Education Site Supervisor degree and PDC Permaculture Design Certificate. When Ruth was a young girl, her father, David, began purchasing farmland in the Midwest with an aim to pass these farms to his two daughters. Without being raised on a farm, aside from the urban one acre Arizona garden her family owned, Ruth stepped into the role as Farm Manager of the family land in Iowa and South Dakota in 2012. She learned the farm business and caring for farmland from soup to nuts primarily through studying the web, engaging with NRCS and FSA offices, and attending farm conferences and field days. Her art includes travel photography, portraiture, wheel and hand built ceramics, interior design and landscape design and installation.  Her  newest art form is wood farm signs, embellished with names of farm locations and carvings of the plants and animals that live on the farms. ​ Ruth is a part of the following organizations:  Practical Farmers of Iowa  Women, Food and Agriculture Network  Climate Land Leaders  Xerces Society  Pheasants Forever  Iowa Farmers Union  Environmental Defense Fund  ​ From Oxbow Farms: We acknowledge that Oxbow Farms is located on Indigenous Lands of the Ochethi Sakowin, Sauk, Meskawaki, Kaw, Wahpeton, Yanktonai and recognize the Indigenous peoples who have lived and continue to live on these lands. _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ecotheatrelab.com for links to Ruth&#39;s work and how to connect with her, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this brief feedback form (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

Documenting Climate Resilience Through Art: Ruth Rabinowitz

Omar de Kok-Mercado is a photographer, videographer, musician, researcher, and farmer. His technical expertise in soil microbiology and agroecology informs his creative practice. He incorporates this technical knowledge into the inner workings of his creations building sculptures that interact with the natural world. In a hyper-connected world stripped of mystery, his work reflects our innate curiosity and works to cultivate our sense of wonder. Whether that’s flying custom built drones through an oak savanna or simulating space time dynamics via video feedback generated through four foot autonomous kaleidoscopes, his work demonstrates it’s still a wild world ripe for exploration. Omar lives on his farm with his wife and son, two dogs, two cats, and a herd of virtually fenced goats in rural Pilot Mound, Iowa, the ancestral homelands of the Ioway tribe, with Sauk and Fox tribes to the east and Omaha to the west.  _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ecotheatrelab.com for links to Omar&#39;s work and how to connect with him, the transcript for this episode, and more information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this brief feedback form (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)! _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants Louie Jordan - Sound Technician

Envisioning Climate Futures Through Art: Omar de Kok-Mercado

In this episode, producer Vivian M. Cook, provides a summary of each of the thirteen interview episodes in The Art of Climate Dialogue: Stories from Iowa. She also discusses some of the themes that emerged throughout the series. Feel free to listen to this episode if you&#39;re trying to get a sense of which episodes are of most interest to you, or if you&#39;re interested in an overview of the themes and recommendations explored by the series&#39; interviewees. However, this episode is not a necessary precursor to the rest of the series, and feel free to jump right in with the interview episodes! _______ Visit The EcoTheatre Lab&#39;s website at ecotheatrelab.com for all episodes, transcripts, and information about the podcast, production team, and The EcoTheatre Lab. This podcast series is all about finding ways to talk about climate change with each other. The EcoTheatre Lab wants to also be in dialogue with our listeners!  Please let us know your thoughts on this episode through this brief feedback form (tinyurl.com/artofclimatedialogue)!  _______ Thank you to our podcast funders: Johnson Center for Land Stewardship Policy Emerging Leader Award and North Central Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program Graduate Student Grant.* This podcast is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under agreement number 2021-38640-34714 through the North Central Region SARE program under project number GNC22-345. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this podcast are those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. _______ Thank you to our podcast production team: Vivian M. Cook - Producer, Host, and Editor Taylor Sklenar - Introductory Episode Editor Rosie Marcu-Rowe - Podcast Series Editor Moselle Nita Singh - Cover Artist Omar de Kok-Mercado - Musician Charissa Menefee, Taylor Sklenar, and Mary Swander - Consultants

Teaser: The Art of Climate Dialogue

A podcast series  featuring thirteen conversations with artists, farmers, community-engaged researchers, and community organizers and activists who have used arts and storytelling strategies to talk about climate change and agriculture in Iowa. Through this podcast, interviewees share these strategies so that listeners can implement them in their own communities.  Visit The EcoTheatre Lab's website at ecotheatrelab.com to find out more information about the podcast and all the interviewees!

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The Art of Climate Dialogue: Stories from Iowa

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