Growing Papaya Trees: Nurturing Indigenous Roots During Climate Displacement

Jessica Hernandez, Indigenous scientist, climate justice activist, and author 

Indigenous scholar, scientist, and community advocate, Dr. Jessica Hernandez (Binnizá/Zapotec and Maya Ch'orti'), discusses Growing Papaya Trees: Nurturing Indigenous Roots During Climate Displacement. She offers readers an Indigenous, Global-South lens on the climate crisis, delivering a compelling and urgent exploration of its causes—and its costs. Hernandez shares how the impacts of colonial climate catastrophe—from warming oceans to forced displacement of settler ontologies—can only be addressed at the root if we reorient toward Indigenous science and follow the lead of Indigenous peoples and communities.

This public forum is open for full participation by all individuals regardless of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, or any other protected category under applicable federal law, state law, and the University's nondiscrimination policy.

Co-sponsored by the Center for Social Science Scholarship; the Department of Emergency and Disaster Health Systems; and the Department of Geography and Environmental Systems.