Relentless Indigenous Woman Podcast
Welcome to the Relentless Indigenous Woman podcast—a space for uncensored and unapologetic conversations on the lived realities of Indigenous Peoples.
Hosted by Dr. Candace Manitopyes, a proud Moose Cree First Nation educator, advocate, and scholar, this podcast invites you to listen, grow, and take meaningful action.
With a community of over 750,000 followers across social media, Dr. Manitopyes has become a powerful voice in bold Indigenous education, truth-telling, and solidarity.
Here, education becomes rebellion. Resistance. Revolution.
Whether you are an Indigenous listener or an ally committed to learning, this podcast exists to challenge, inspire, and empower.
www.relentlessindigenouswoman.ca
Relentless Indigenous Woman Podcast
Ep. 38: The Pedagogy of Moss: Lessons in Fluidity, Belonging, and Resilience with Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer
Dr. Candace Manitopyes sits down with the beloved scientist, writer, and matriarch Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of Braiding Sweetgrass and Gathering Moss. They weave a dialogue on remembrance, resistance, and relationality, where Indigenous knowledge and scientific thought meet in the shared soil of hope.
Dr. Kimmerer reflects on her newest movement, Plant Baby Plant, which calls people to resist extraction by restoring reciprocity through regeneration. She and Candace speak candidly about despair, joy as an act of resistance, and the necessity of holding “two buckets”(one for grief, one for goodness) at once.
Their exchange moves through moss, language, and the sacred act of remembering. They explore how moss teaches us gender fluidity, adaptability, and queerness, and how Indigenous languages reveal a world where everything (water, trees, even a bay) is alive and in motion. They consider what it means to unlearn colonial rigidity, to delight in being wrong, and to find flexibility through humility and curiosity.
This episode feels like an offering of hope in a time of dismemberment. It reminds us that the revolution begins with the choice to create, nurture, and remember our membership in the living world.
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Relentless Reflections
- What parts of yourself, your culture, or your relationship with the land have been “dismembered”? Reflect on what remembering might look like for you, not just recalling, but rejoining the living web that has always held you.
- When was the last time you allowed yourself to be wrong, and what did it reveal? Consider what humility makes possible. How could embracing the delight of being wrong expand your capacity for relationship, creativity, or solidarity?
Relentless Actions
- Begin your own “Plant Baby Plant” practice. Whether it’s tending herbs on a windowsill, planting seeds with children, or volunteering in a community garden, ground your resistance in regeneration.
- Practice language as ceremony. Choose one phrase or word from your language (or the local Indigenous language where you live) that reminds you the world is alive. Speak it aloud. Let it rewire how you see everything around you.
Relentless Resources
- PlantBabyPlant.com – A growing movement co-founded by Dr. Kimmerer that transforms resistance into regeneration through the act of planting and caring for the Earth.
- The Pedagogy of Moss - The award-nominated PhD dissertation of Dr. Candace
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Music Produced by Award-Winning Anishnaabe DJ Boogey the Beat