Western botany frames plants as objects while Indigenous science treats them as subjects

Evidence

In moving from a childhood in the woods to the university I had unknowingly shifted between worldviews, from a natural history of experience, in which I knew plants as teachers and companions to whom I was linked with mutual responsibility, into the realm of science. The questions scientists raised were not “Who are you? ” but “What is it?” No one asked plants, “What can you tell us?” The primary question was “How does it work?” The botany I was taught was reductionist, mechanistic, and strictly objective. Plants were reduced to objects; they were not subjects. — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass, 150

Categorization

• XREF: This worldview shift directly maps the polyad’s settler-colonial critique thread and the Land Relationships course — plants-as-subject vs. plant-as-property parallels ch4’s gift-vs-property divide. — connects to: Indigenous identity is essentially connected to land, unlike the instrumental western model — Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature, 546; Western science dismissed plant communication by measuring plants against animal capacities — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom,…, 76; Indigenous knowledge and Western science can coexist as complementary polycultures — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom,…, 487 (+7 more)
• DEFINE: Contrasts the two knowledge traditions’ core questions (Who are you? vs What is it?) — foundational for defining the two-eyed seeing the polyad needs.

Broader Connections

• Indigenous knowledge and Western science can coexist as complementary polycultures #qualifies (0.75) — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass, 487
• Indigenous and Western knowledge converge but must be translated into mechanistic language #qualifies (0.75) — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass, 580
• Indigenous plant knowledge holds that plants arrive where and when their gifts are needed #expands (0.72) — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Gathering Moss, 419
• A scientific framework’s presuppositions are culturally and historically conditioned #expands (0.72) — The Friends of Attention, Attensity!, 148
• Full understanding requires both scientific and indigenous ways of knowing #expands (0.72) — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Gathering Moss, 37
• Science’s truth monopoly blocks recognition of Indigenous knowledge #expands (0.70) — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass, 558
• Colonial categories formed in the same ambiguous space as scientific objects #expands (0.70)