Other Biological Futures: Piko A, Piko O, Piko I: Those That Came Before, Those That are Here Now, and Those That Will Come After

Ahilapalapa Rands (Kanaka Maoli, iTaukei, Pākehā) is an artist and curator working in London, Aotearoa (New Zealand), and Hawaii as a founding member of the collectives In*ter*is*land Collective, and D.A.N.C.E. art club. Her focus is on issues relevant to indigeneity. She investigates the mechanisms through which settler colonization continues to inform narratives and power dynamics in Moana nui a Kiwa (Oceania). Kiana Frank is a microbiologist and indigenous science educator based at the Pacific Biosciences Research Center at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa. Her research integrates biology, geochemistry, and ʻike kupuna (traditional knowledge) to address novel hypotheses and explore connections between contemporary and indigenous science. Frank is advancing place-based knowledge and ecological-based studies to foster values and concepts of traditional management in a changing climate.

What if the fastest road to the future has to do with slowing down and looking at—and tasting—where we’ve already been? Indigenous peoples who live in symbiosis with the natural systems that surround them have developed a unique and deep-rooted awareness of the connection between people, place, and practice. This awareness influences the shape and function of their societies, which in turn can reveal other ways of knowledge-making, offering alternatives to the anthropocentric view endemic in science today. In this conversation, Ahilapalapa and Kiana explore other cultural models and approaches to ecological understandings that expand biodesign, sending it in new, sustainable directions.

For full article go to Other Biological Futures.