February 21st, Thursday at 12-1:30pm | Dr. White Room
Hosted by Global Sustainability Resource Center & Cross-Cultural Center
Two graduate students, Emanuel and Abel, will share their narrative on their experience with the community-run garden in Santa Ana, CRECE. We will explore the concept of wellness and healing through gardening. Join us to take part in this discussion and the hands on activity of planting your own seed.
RSVP for Free Lunch
https://tinyurl.com/culturalgardening
Take a plant home !
Speakers: Emmanuel Preciado and Abel Ruiz
Emanuel “Manny” Preciado is a 2nd year Ph.D. student in Urban Planning and Policy focused on community-driven planning, urban sociology, social movements, and community-based research. Manny’s research examines the intersections of space, culture, and politics in urban communities of color. Currently, he’s working with an urban garden in Santa Ana, CA that seeks to transform the local food system through healthy and culturally sustaining foods, community-based stewardship of land, and equitable policy advocacy.
Abel Ruiz- Much of my personal journey since my family came to the United States has been acknowledging the differences in life that physical borders have created but also the internal borders that are created when you migrate. The experience of feeling separated by physical borders from homeland and loved ones but also historically, psychologically, and spiritually is something that has shaped my search for healing and my connection with oppressed peoples from all over. These experiences have led me to reconnect to the activity of growing my own food and the warmth that I have been able to find in the soil, which despite the distance from my homeland it smells just as beautifully when we tend to it. To see the nurturing power of food and working collectively is an experience that I don’t see in any other career and that’s why I chose to follow it. I am currently a member of a urban gardening project called CRECE. We aspire to become a cooperative that can empower other POC to transform our food system through the creation of urban food projects that creates food and people sovereignty.