Upcoming talk will discuss link between Black liberation and herbalism (February 22 Newsletter)

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Good morning and welcome to the Peterborough Currents newsletter.

February is winding down, but there are still some Black History Month events to catch in Peterborough. Among them is a talk by a local woman with roots in Louisiana about her research into how her African American ancestors used herbal medicine to resist slavery. We spoke to her about what she discovered.

Also in this week’s newsletter: what will the federal government’s cap on the number of international students mean for Peterborough?

Plus: Ontario’s chief medical officer of health says health units that don’t voluntarily merge could face layoffs.

“Africans that were enslaved had traditional ecological knowledge“

Since the days of slavery, herbal medicine has played an important but often overlooked role in Black liberation, according to local herbalist Kelly McDowell. That’s the thesis of a talk McDowell will give at Trent University’s Seasoned Spoon Café next Monday at 6 p.m., as part of Black History Month celebrations.

McDowell, who is the co-founder of the Peterborough Community Medicine Garden (located on the Trent campus), has roots in Louisiana. For the last three years she’s been learning everything she can about the herbal traditions of her African American ancestors.

“Africans that were enslaved had traditional ecological knowledge,” McDowell said. “They were very skilled agriculturalists as well as medicine people, and that knowledge came with them [to North America].”

Their knowledge of plants helped Black people resist slavery and oppression for generations, according to McDowell.

When plantation owners tried to force enslaved people to bear more children as a means of getting more free labour, women used the root of the cotton plant to induce abortions, she said. “Women were actively using these roots to control their own reproductive rights.” Even the famous abolitionist Harriet Tubman practiced herbalism, using herbal medicines to treat the illnesses of enslaved people as they fled the U.S. south.

Unequal access to health care for Black people has helped keep herbal traditions alive in the U.S. south, according to McDowell.

In McDowell’s view, those traditions have a lot to teach everyone. She said she sees “a real longing” in people today to “connect with nature in a deep way,” like her ancestors did. 

“In many ways, all of us have been enslaved to an economic system that is exploiting and killing this planet,” McDowell said. The knowledge of African American herbalists can be a source of “inspiration for our own liberation” from that system, she said. 

Her forebears took charge of their own health through “cultivating a relationship with the plants” around them, something that anyone can do to improve their wellbeing, according to McDowell.

She said there’s still a role for modern medicine to play, but especially considering the strain the healthcare system is under right now, people need to be more proactive about their wellbeing.

“There’s so much more we can be doing as active people engaged in our own health,” she said.

You can find tickets to McDowell’s talk here.

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Local reactions to international student cap

The day Purnima Gurung arrived in Peterborough to study at Fleming College, she still didn’t know where she was going to live.

Gurung, who is from Nepal, managed to find a short-term rental, but it was far from ideal. “I had to share one house with 15 people,” she said. For four months, Gurung slept in one room with two roommates at a cost of $500 a month, she said.

As international students struggle to find housing and jobs in Peterborough, the federal government has instituted a new cap on the number of students who are permitted to come to Canada each year.

Gurung disagrees with the cap. She described her housing challenges as “part of the struggle” of studying in Canada and said if other international students want to come here and face that struggle, “it’s their choice.”

But other international students at Fleming hope the cap will mean they face less competition for housing and jobs. “There are no houses for the students,” said Moksh Nigam, a recent Fleming graduate from India who supports the new cap.

Want to learn more about how the new cap might impact Peterborough? Read our full story here.

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Other stories to watch

Health unit merger talks

Ontario’s chief medical officer of health says public health units that don’t agree to voluntarily merge could face layoffs due to government “austerity.” Dr. Kieran Moore made the comments at a meeting of the Haliburton Kawartha Pine Ridge District Health Unit, which is exploring the possibility of merging with Peterborough Public Health. Moore said provincial funding for health units is “well below” what’s needed. “That means layoffs and I’m very sorry about that,” he said. However, the Ford government is offering a three-year funding boost to health units that opt to merge. “Realistically, this is the only means by which we can help you fiscally,” Moore said. The lack of funding for public health is due to “the austerity that I think the government’s having to do given the provincial deficit,” he said. Read more about the merger talks over at KawarthaNOW.

Cileana Taylor assault trial

Jordan Morin has been sentenced to four years in jail for assaulting Curve Lake First Nation’s Cileana Taylor in 2020, the Peterborough Examiner reports. But the judge gave Morin credit for time already served, meaning he will only have to spend an additional one and a half years behind bars. Morin admitted to choking Taylor, who was 22, until she fell unconscious and hit her head in a parking lot in Sept. 2020. Shortly after, the Indigenous woman suffered a seizure and had to be put on life support. She never regained vital signs and died in early 2021. Morin was only charged with aggravated assault because a pathologist could not say for certain that Taylor’s death was a result of the attack, according to the Crown prosecutor in the case.

City council open house

City residents will have a chance to speak with Mayor Jeff Leal and city councillors this Sunday, February 25, as part of an open house at the council chambers inside city hall. Coffee, tea, juice and local baked goods will be served. It runs from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.

Black History Month Showcase

Black Lives Matter Nogojiwanong is presenting “an evening filled with diverse performances that highlight the rich culture and contributions of Black communities” at Wenjack Theatre on February 24 beginning at 7:30 p.m. More information here. 

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