Seeds of our Ancestors

Seeds of our Ancestors grows out of the poetic explorations of native urban youth as they struggle to overcome trauma caused by colonized/industrial foods and awaken to the healing and nourishment of native foodways from their own traditions and those of others. Learning from teachers and traditional ecological knowledge-bearers steeped in traditions as diverse as California Maidu, Yucatec Maya and Seneca, the youth root down into the cultural soils that support ancient and vital foodways traditions, including crop cultivation, acorn processing, cooking, seed-saving and simply sharing food in community.
This documentary was co-created with the young native participants of a Native Foodways and Media Youth Internship in San Francisco, California, Turtle Island. The group’s collective process included learning the new technology of audiovisual storytelling to serve the ancestral technology of native foodways. This co-creative journey manifests itself in interwoven voices and organic montage which explore the most pressing concerns of the young participants: cultural healing, ecological health, the history of disease caused by processed foods, and the current problems of food deserts in impoverished urban areas. Balancing these dire social and ecological issues are hope-inspiring stories as well as soundscapes that create percussive music from the sounds of harvesting corn and grinding acorns.