Black Botany Studio

Note: In Spring 2022, UC Santa Cruz students had an opportunity to participate in a virtual “Making with Marigold” workshop hosted by the Black Botany Studio and guided by visiting guest artist scholar Jennifer Steverson. In this post, one of the student participants (paradyse) reflects on his workshop experience.

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by paradyse oakley

I applied to the Making with Marigold Workshop with Black Botany Studio because of my personal interest with plants, the ancestor work and memory work, as well as my journey of becoming a Birthworker for my community. During the earlier stages of the pandemic, one of the plants that I felt called to grow in our backyard was the Marigold. It has been a beautiful journey watching it grow, practice seed saving, and planting them again for the next season. The plants grew so peaceful in the backyard with their warm and welcoming colors of yellow, orange, and red. In the Black Botanical Medicine in the Americas course at UC Santa Cruz with Dr. Jones, each week we travel with a plant. I was very excited to explore Marigold within the community.

In relation to practicing community care -I believe we take about our ancestors and bring them into the space with us as a form of grounding ourselves in the virtual space. I bring into the space my great-grandmother Betty Young – who first introduced me to gardening, the importance of connecting with the land, and patience. Through their practices of tending to their plants and herbs on their property – I think about the botanical knowledge she shared with me growing up and with my Mother. As well as the importance of honoring our ancestors and where we come from with the practice of libations, seed saving, burial, and connecting with the land.

Some knowledge that I gained from Professor Naya Jones and Jennifer Steverson in the workshop would be the very fun process of sealing the fabric to make it easier to take when completing the dye process. This included a new way of working with plant medicine – through color as we dye our cotton. Learning that we can use different plant pigments such as hibiscus, indigo, and lavender to create a natural dye.

A practice that we did at the end of the workshop, was re-dipping the plant-based cotton into our Marigold mixture for a minimum of two -three times depending on the vibrance and depth of the color we would like to achieve in the process with a five minute break in between. This was an important step and reminder that sometimes you have to take a moment to pause or moment to catch your breath. Sometimes things take time for us to achieve our intended goals, we must be willing to pivot and explore the space around us. Especially given that the Marigold plant requires a lot of sun and water.

When building a community, we were able to honor the current land that we occupy + our ancestors, introduce ourselves to the plant Marigold in terms of Black Botanical Medicine, snaps, asé, laughter, pauses, dancing, and sharing parts of ourselves with the space. I filled my space with lemongrass and eucalyptus essential oil, my plants, and fairy lights. I boiled my water with my kettle and pot, wiped out my bucket, and cleaned my tongs. My box was already prepared and blessed by the Black Botany Studio folxs – the packaging and instructions were very carefully wrapped for us to engage with in the workshop.

In the next couple of months, I’ll be heading back down to Southern California where I will continue to cultivate the knowledge that I have gained over this past academic year and plant some seeds with my siblings in our backyard.

During this time, I plan on continuing my passion of garden to table meals for my family and friends with plants, herbs, and vegetables that are grown in the backyard. I will be outdoors a lot hosting hikes, walks, and visiting National Parks, which is a perfect time to learn about the plants native to Tongva Land and where we will explore through the Picture This mobile application which assists with plant identification.

Further Reading and Resources:

all about love by bell hooks

Emergent Strategy and Pleasure Activism by adrienne maree brown

Farming While Black by Leah Penniman

The Color of Food: Stories of Race, Resilience and Farming by Natasha Bowens

Playlist for “Making with Marigold” (curated by paradyse): https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3zGiIIW0dnr1C4KNEmJ19N?si=90f79e753c1946f1

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paradyse oakley, originally from South Central Los Angeles, is currently attending the University of Californian Santa Cruz and is majoring in Community Studies, Critical Race and Ethnic Studies and Politics. paradyse is currently working with the CASFS (the Center for Agroecology & Sustainable Food Systems) as a Major Outreach and Program Coordinator in the Agroecology Department. paradyse has presented their research on Healing through Eco-Grief and Radical Self-Love Healing through Hip Hop. As a Facilitator, paradyse enjoys connecting with people, works to create a brave space, and makes an ongoing effort to create a brave future to learn and grow.

Note: In Spring 2022, UC Santa Cruz students had an opportunity to participate in a virtual “Making with Marigold” workshop hosted by the Black Botany Studio and guided by visiting guest artist scholar Jennifer Steverson. In this post, one of the student participants (Ethan) reflects on his workshop experience.

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by Ethan D. 

As a Afro-Latinx-Caribbean male living in California, it can be difficult to be in touch with my ancestral roots. This is the product of multiple factors, that being geographic isolation from my family in the Caribbean, and the highly concentration of Caribbean people being in the East Coast (New York, Massachusetts, etc.). In addition, because of COVID and lack of vaccine availability in the Caribbean, my usual pilgrimages to my extended family have ceased along with my yearly trips to see my grandparents in Grenada.

I remember my grandma telling me stories about her life growing up as well as folk tales and ancestral history, but what interested me the most in this context was the use of natural resources, especially squid ink for writing. Though today I do not use much botanical medicine in my life, save for making sure to eat healthy, I still have the love for plants my grandmother instilled in my mom, and of which she instilled in me. I have 10 plants I take care of, and teach many of the folks around me who have an interest how to transplant plants, general care and maintenance These plants include: Pothos, Snake plant, Plumosa fern, and a selection of succulents. I am proud of my knowledge, but what I always try to center is that I, like the people I assist are still learning. Anytime I go to my local nursery, I try to come to that place in the energy of a student absorbing what I learn, and through that I can become a better carer of plants. Overconfidence and pride can only close oneself from knowledge.

What was enlightening and welcoming about the Making with Marigold Workshop was how welcoming the space was and how every culture, yet different, has ways of dyeing fabric. Some of my favorite parts of the workshop is the background given at each step. Examples include the use of mordanting, and Ms. Steverson’s background and introduction to dyeing. She did not have to do this, but teacher who talk of how they learned what they are teaching make the material more accessible and real, and that is the exact feeling I had when learning. A feeling of nervousness and wonder at this natural dye and the final product.

Having this workshop felt collaborative in more than the directions given, but the context we were in. In the Black Botanical Medicine in the Americas course (SOCY 143), those with an interest take the class, and each identity of folks that comes in can be traced back to many differing parts of the world. Having a focus on Blackness is revolutionary to the many common ways botanical medicine is taught. Many practices and knowledge often is not attributed to Africa or the people in the African Diaspora, which can be confusing to even consider that the cradle of humanity did not have any advancements that we do not use. For example, any and all biomedicine can be traced back to botanical medicine, as biomedicine is botanical research in a Western medicinal view. Yet even that view discredits the work done first in Africa, and spread to other continents, and their own areas of academic, botanical, and biomedicine those cultures have created. Many of the first universities were not of European origin, but of African origin, including areas in Egypt, Mali, and Morocco (for example Barnes 2022).

What I also appreciated about the marigolds was that it brought up my memory of shared practices in the Caribbean with multiple ethnic groups. As an Afro-Latinx-Caribbean with ancestry from Grenada, Cuba, and Jamaica, it is interesting to see the commonalities between cultures. As many cultures do use Marigolds, in the same way do many cultures in the Caribbean utilize tamarind, mango, and of course jamaica and sorrel. My Dad, who is Jamaican and Cuban, would often create different Caribbean drinks and food to keep us near to the culture, and sorrel was one beverage I remember him making with excitement and telling us the history of it. In the way that this workshop reinforced my blackness, it also made me aware of intersection and commonalities between cultures.

Works Cited: 

Mo Barnes. “Black history month: The oldest university in the world is in Africa.” (2019, February 9). Rolling Out. Retrieved June 9, 2022, from https://rollingout.com/2019/02/09/black-history-month-the-oldest-university-in-the-world-is-in-africa/

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Ethan D. is a Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology Major B.S. and Black Studies minor (University of California Santa Cruz ‘23). I am from Riverside, CA and have interests in history, plants, hiking, and learning music, specifically guitar and vocals. My hope is to attend law school after a gap year with an interest in copyright and intellectual property law.

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On April 21, 2022, the Black Botany Studio hosted its first virtual workshop with  Independent Scholar and Multimedia Artist Jennifer Steverson. During the workshop UC Santa Cruz undergraduate and graduate students engaged with the history of marigold (Tagetes erecta) and learned how to dye with marigold flower.

The workshop was an interdisciplinary space. Students participated from across departments and fields. Many of them brought personal experiences with marigold, botanical knowledge of their own, or a background in the arts with them. Some were also enrolled in the Black Botanical Medicine in the Americas course (SOCY 143) in Spring 2022, a course that considers how plants been central to Black-led community health and healing in the North and Latin America.

As a research lab and co-learning space, the Black Botany Studio cultivates creative inquiry about Black botanical knowledge past and present. The Studio exists to archive, lift up, and theorize Black botanical knowledge amid global contexts such as COVID-19, the Black Lives Matter movement, and climate change. Dr. Naya Jones leads the Studio, working closely with Graduate Student Researchers.

A special thank you to Graduate Student Researchers Betania Santos and Chris Lang  for co-facilitating  the Making with Marigold workshop. Betania promoted the events, crafted the workshop kits, and organized communications, while Chris introduced the workshop with insight into the social, environmental, and economic significance of marigold.

Jennifer Steverson was the inaugural Visiting Artist-Scholar for the Black Botany Studio from 2021-2022. Jennifer’s research explores the intersections of craft, placemaking, and spiritual practice within Southern Black communities. Her artistic practice combines indigo dyeing with quilting, and patterns that echo African Diaspora surface design motifs.

Learn more about Steverson’s work at www.genevajean.com. Follow Black Botany Studio updates here.

This virtual workshop was supported in part by a Sprout Grant from the  Institute for Social Transformation at UC Santa Cruz.

Thank you to the workshop co-sponsors for spreading the word: El Centro, the African American Resource & Cultural Center,  John R. Lewis College, and the People of Color Sustainability Initiative at UC Santa Cruz.

Read reflections from students!

Visit these blogs by paradyse o. and Ethan D. about their experience participating in “Making with Marigold” >>

Virtual Snapshot: