On 40 acres up Highway 299, HSU associate professor of English Renée Byrd is working to create a radical space of healing that is grounded in abolition ecologies and BIPOC land justice. Named Earthseed Laboratories, this emerging project aims to become a community farm and retreat center that will provide a space for refuge and critical engagement. The idea for this project came to Byrd many years ago when she and her best friend would dream about the concept of a healing farm. Eight years later, their dream is in the process of becoming reality after Earthseed Laboratories was able to acquire the forty-acre land base last spring.
The first part of the name, Earthseed, is inspired by Octavia Butler’s Parable book series, which follows a young protagonist named Lauren who creates her own form of spirituality in the midst of multiple environmental and social crises. Lauren believes that God is change, and that humans need to learn to shape change so as to adapt and survive as a species. Byrd was particularly moved by this book because Lauren is not portrayed as the stereotypical notion of the intellectual up in an ivory tower. Rather, she develops her ideas on scraps of paper and uses the tools she has despite the chaos of her environment. “I’m really inspired by that, because I feel like I come from a long line of Black feminist thinkers who have produced knowledge from very little in that way,” said Byrd. “Writing poems at the kitchen table in a brief moment on the back of an envelope kind of thing.”
The second part of the name, Laboratories, is meant to reclaim notions of experimentation and playfulness in a positive way. As Byrd explains, laboratories often have negative associations for marginalized groups, as there has been a long history of unethical experimentation that folks of color and poor folks have experienced under the guise of medicine and science. By reclaiming the word laboratories as part of the project, Byrd hopes to create “…a space where we can play around with new ways of being in the world, with new ways of structuring the world…and really intentionally grounding it in the wisdom of BIPOC communities and queer communities in a way that we don’t often see in similar kinds of retreat, farm, or environmental spaces.”
The philosophy and politics behind Earthseed have developed because of Byrd’s experience of working in abolition since she was eighteen. Despite being very attached to environmental causes when she was a kid, she became wary of environmentalism as she got older because she never felt her identity fit in. It wasn’t until the early 2000’s when Byrd became involved in a movement to shut down a prison that she became aware of the power of coalition building between environmental and prison activists. Through collaboration, the prison was successfully shut down because of the existence of an endangered species.
Recognizing the connections between these various issues is at the heart of abolition ecologies for Byrd. Abolition ecologies lie at the intersection of four different kinds of justice: racial justice, climate justice, land justice, and healing justice. This framework requires the critical evaluation of the way colonialism and anti-Black violence are bound up in the current political system. Using abolition ecologies as a guiding philosophy for Earthseed will allow communities to heal and imagine other ways of organizing themselves to meet their basic needs.
A big part of that healing comes with centering relationships to land, as Byrd believes the land’s healing and our healing are bound up together. Five years ago, when Byrd’s daughter was born, the urgency of abolition and the importance of slow healing became paramount. Watching Trump get elected while holding her newborn child, Byrd decided she couldn’t wait any longer to build the world that was needed and decided to make the Earthseed Laboratories website. Since then, the project has been steadily gaining momentum. “Given the crises that we face, I don’t think we can be sure that we have the right answers all the time,” said Byrd. “But there’s no waiting, right? There’s no waiting for climate justice. There’s no waiting to be prepared anymore. And I think the last few years have really shown a lot of us that we really can’t wait and that we’re building the new world now…whether we want to or not.”
Buying the land was a big step for Byrd, and this first year has been a practice of listening and learning what the land needs while taking walks with folks who inspire her. Because the land used to be an illegal marijuana grow, there is a lot of remediation that needs to be done. The forest was once clear cut, so Earthseed Laboratories is trying to raise money for a wood chipper to help create a healthy forest and stabilize the ground. Despite these challenges, Byrd describes the land as “gorgeous”. In addition to the people working hard to heal the land, Earthseed Laboratories has acquired a starter herd of Angora fiber goats who produce mohair, all while improving the soil health.
In the future, Byrd aspires to build a barn, greenhouse, and a working farm operation that does non-timber forest products. She imagines a forest farm with logs inoculated with mushrooms, medicinal herbs, and a thriving fruit and vegetable garden. There will be chickens, ducks, and maybe alpacas. They are currently in the process of looking for people to do some kind of hydropower project, so they can take advantage of the natural water sources. The future vision also includes micro villages scattered across the land, connected by multiple trails that lead to earthen altars.
In addition to the working farm, retreats will be a big part of the project, and Byrd wants Earthseed to be a place of refuge for people getting out of prison or those in need of a reset. A central part of this vision is working to build businesses owned by those who were formerly incarcerated p. As part of the Polytechnic prospectus for HSU, there are also plans for a twin organization called the Rose Braz Institute for Abolition Ecologies. This institute will provide internships, graduate research assistantships, Black farmer technical assistance, and a speaker series in conjunction with Earthseed Laboratories.
Building a space that centers Black liberation and prioritizes Black and Indigenous solidarity is important and slow work that can be daunting in a lot of ways. However, Byrd thinks that now is the time to be asking how we want to live in relationship with each other and the earth. “These systems aren’t necessarily going to decide that our lives are worthy…so we need to be thinking about how we build community and also how that has to be really explicitly racial justice focused and decolonial,” said Byrd. Earlier in the interview she articulated “…it’s not just about dismantling the police. It’s also about building the kind of world we want to live in and one where Black people are safe and belong and we get to bring our gifts to the world.”
If you would like to support Earthseed, follow them on instagram (@earthseedlabs) or facebook, sign up for their newsletter, become a patron on patreon ($10/$15 monthly donations make a huge difference), become a founding investor by contacting earthseedlabs@gmail.com, or help purchase necessary items from the wishlist myregistry.com.