Taking Care of Our Home: Northeastern Indigenous Land Stewardship Practices and Caring for the Land Today
Wednesday, October 29, 2025 11am ET
North Atlantic Fire Science Exchange will be hosting the Indigenous Landscape Initiative (In Land) for a webinar on Wednesday, October 29, 2025 from 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM EDT.
Synopsis: What did the Northeastern landscape look like before contact? How did Indigenous peoples of the region steward the land, and why did their methods work so well to sustain healthy, resilient, biodiverse landscapes that provided for their human inhabitants? We will explore these questions as well as consider what we are losing with the loss of this stewardship. This webinar will also introduce the Indigenous Landscape Initiative (In Land), a new organization devoted to involving Native and non-Native communities in reviving Native stewardship practices to care for our home – for ecological health, food for people, and building relationships with the land and each other.
Speaker: Shlomiya Lightfoot is the founder and executive director of the Indigenous Landscape Initiative (In Land). She has a Bachelor’s degree in biology with an ecology focus, and her Ph.D. research examined stakeholder involvement in environmental decision-making. Much of Shlomiya’s work has been devoted to the intersection of environmental and human wellbeing, helping to make sure people from all walks of life can contribute to, and benefit from, efforts to care for our planet.