One spring day, I arrived at Toronto’s High Park Oak Savannah to visit a tree. I was very upset to arrive at the park to see that the area in which my tree resided had been sprayed with toxic pesticides. There were signs warning humans to stay out. The contamination felt personal. If pesticides were not safe for humans, how could it be safe for my tree?   Lillian Pearce writes, “We must reckon with our ancestral kin as they speak through our bodies of people and earth, in relationships of beauty as much as of contamination.” (Pearce, 2021, p. 94) 

Date of Filming: August 1, 2022

Location: Toronto, Ontario

Credits:

dance by Julia Aplin

Music by John Gzowski

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Pearce, L., (2021). The Politics of Contaminated Kin. In G. Van Horn, R.W. Kimmerer &  J. Hausdoerffer (Eds.),   Kinship:Belonging in a World of Relations. Volume 2. (1st ed., pp. 87-94).