We vis­it two dis­tinct projects work­ing with food to revi­tal­ize iden­ti­ty and ancestry:

Part one: In many Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties, there’s a gap in knowl­edge about grow­ing and cook­ing tra­di­tion­al foods. On the Black­feet Nation in rur­al Mon­tana, Mari­ah Glad­stone and Ken­neth Cook are try­ing to change that. They launched an online cook­ing show called Indigik­itchen and in this episode, we fol­low them into the field as they har­vest a bison and film the process.

Part two: Dr. Keit­lyn Alcan­tara stud­ies the rea­son the Tlax­cala, an indige­nous tribe liv­ing in cen­tral Mex­i­co, were able to sur­vive the expan­sive Aztec empire in the peri­od just before col­o­niza­tion. Her analy­sis of their remains shows they sur­vived in part because of the way they cul­ti­vat­ed and shared food. So, with the help of the Bloom­ing­ton, Indi­ana com­mu­ni­ty, she start­ed a Heal­ing Gar­den — a place espe­cial­ly for mem­bers of a dias­po­ra to con­nect with famil­iar plants, with the earth and with each other.