Reclaiming Indigenous Lifeways & Foodways - Denisa Livingston
According to the USDA, 99% of Navajo Nation is a "food desert." However, Denisa Livingston from Dine Community Advocacy Alliance and the Slow Food International Council, holds that the lack of healthy foods in the Navajo Nation is more accurately described as food apartheid. Reflecting on the multigenerational impacts of unhealthy foods and drinks in the Navajo Nation that stem from a history of dispossession and harm, Denisa discusses how the fight to reduce sugary drink and other unhealthy food consumption is a matter of reclaiming indigenous lifeways and foodways. She talks about the Healthy Dine Nation Act of 2014, a 2% tax on unhealthy foods and foods with minimal-to-no nutritional value, and the importance of uplifting food as medicine. Further drawing from her lived experience and work, Denisa discusses the need for the struggle for food sovereignty to center community connection and healing and the ways language and culture are central to the fight.
This episode of In Praxis is a part of Season 2: Sugar Sweetened Beverage Taxes. Learn more about Praxis’ work around SSB taxes on our Centering Community & Equity Through Sugary Drink Tax Investments page.
The information, opinions, views, and conclusions proposed in this episode are those of our podcast guests.
You can also tune into this episode on Anchor, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Stitcher. Below is a transcript of the episode, edited for readability. You can also watch this episode on YouTube with subtitles for accessibility.
Reclaiming Indigenous Lifeways & Foodways – Denisa Livingston
Podcast Transcription
When it comes to us as Indigenous People, the biggest thing is that these foods were never part of our diet. Sugar and flour were introduced when my people were sent on the Long Walk called, Hwééldi, and they were sent by the U.S. government to a concentration camp where these foods were introduced. And to this day, we are still fighting these foods.
[Podcast intro tunes]
[In Praxis Intro] You are listening to In Praxis, a podcast by The Praxis Project created to support, hear from, and uplift the stories coming out of the ecosystem of basebuilding organizing. An ecosystem that includes frontline basebuilding groups and the folks who help support their important work. In this season of In Praxis, our hosts, Julian Johnson and Kourtney Nham, focus on sugar sweetened beverage taxes. We have compiled interviews from advocates working on issues surrounding the reduction of sweet and sugary beverages as well as the taxation of these products. Participants of this podcast are community members, public health practitioners, health department representatives, and concerned parents that span across the country. In each episode, you will hear about their phenomenal work as well as their perspective on the health effects of sugary consumption, and in what ways policy can be used to combat this and lead to reinvestment in our communities.
Kourtney Nham: Hi everyone, I’m here today with Denisa Livingston. We're going to be talking a little bit about sugar sweetened beverages. Denisa, do you mind introducing yourself and telling us a little bit about yourself to get started?
Denisa Livingston: Yeah. So, hello everyone, yá'át'ééh, that's a greeting in my Diné language. I am Denisa Livingston, and I am a community health advocate leading the organization the Diné Community Advocacy Alliance here on the Navajo Nation, and we have been a grassroots organization focused on health justice and health policies and really bringing awareness about the lack of access to healthful foods. I also serve as the Slow Food International Indigenous Council of the Global North, and so my work has really been focused on helping our communities worldwide in regards to the epidemics that we face that are food related and as well as empowering our people to be change makers. Thank you for having me.
Kourtney Nham: Yeah, thank you for joining us! Regarding your work, I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about how you first got involved in working on issues of health.
Denisa Livingston: My first experiences have been in my early childhood days. I grew up in a family working on social justice issues, and my grandmother really leading the charge with my uncle who were greatly impacted by my grandpa passing away from direct contamination of uranium. That was from the uranium mining that the U.S. government hired our own people to mine uranium on Navajo land. Since I’ve been growing up in this sort of activities… never did I know that I was growing up in this situation or in in this culture of my grandma really leaving this legacy, being nuclear free, and trying to advocate for the health of the people and the injustices caused by uranium. Growing up in that, in all of the political activities, unaware of the impacts that it would make in a positive manner but also creating change in and around where we live, but also on an international scale the impact that we've had as a family to bring awareness about this issue in other countries. Later on in my life, I continue to navigate towards health and health equity, and as well as health justice and food justice, and received my masters of public health. At that time was also introduced to community members that were also concerned about nutrition and about the diabetes epidemic here on the Navajo Nation. I decided to work with them and to work together to address these issues, but really based on the lack of availability of health, fresh affordable foods, that were pretty much non-existent here on the Navajo nation. We saw a lot of the food and the inventories that were in the stores and the convenience stores—these access points—that it was full of unhealthy food. Since then, I really dived into addressing that but also raising awareness about food traditionalism, food sovereignty, and reclaiming our healthful way of life through our traditional healthy foods. So that's basically what I’ve been through, growing up in it, and then realizing the greater call but also the greater purpose that was also laid before me by my family— especially my grandmother who has been leading this work, and still to this day is continuing to advocate, as well as my uncle who has led this work in regards to helping the people. It's been part of my life but even more seriously as I knew that this is something that I needed to also do.
Kourtney Nham: Wow, that's incredible. I really appreciate how you talk about the legacy and tradition of this work in your family, So, I’m curious you spoke a little bit about working specifically about unhealthy foods, and I’m wondering if you could talk a little bit about how sugary drinks were part of the problem that your community was facing.
Denisa Livingston: Yes so, when I returned from college and was really living back on Navajo, I realized that my day-to-day life was impacted as I would travel long journeys to and from meetings that were far stretched. Like some 50 miles, 100 miles, 200 miles one way. Traveling across my homelands and knowing that food was not something that that I saw as an empowering experience. When we would stop at these access points, we would see nothing but unhealthy food. That personally affected me, the team, and my relatives that I had been working with. Knowing that transitioning to a time of making your own lunch and preparing in advance for these road trips that were a day-to-day experience, that we would have to take our own healthy food with us, because we knew that we wouldn't find it at the local convenience store or at—we did not did not have any healthy access points, for example, like Whole Foods store or establishments that were just focused entirely on healthful foods. This is something that became quite a concern for all of us, as we struggled with that, knowing that these long trips every day to our meetings or to our activities that we were doing, that sometimes you didn't have time to prepare the healthy food or to prepare in advance. We would get stuck either eating at a local eatery that serve mostly fast foods or fried foods or foods that were contaminating our diet. We struggled with that and eventually moved into doing more potlucks at our meetings, where people would bring food to ensure that we would eat healthful foods without having to go out and have fast food or unhealthy food. It was quite some time to recognize that it was going to be a long journey to address this for future generations, but it had to start with us. It had to start with that conversation and knowing that we were up against this, because at that time, the USDA had revealed that we were 99% “food desert.” We knew that this was a part food apartheid, and that we didn't want to call it a food desert. A desert is an ecosystem where it's full of life. So, we knew that we needed to take on this task to be able to empower our people.
Kourtney Nham: That's great, and yeah, building off of that, is there's something in particular that made you decide to put some of your energy into sugary drink consumption in particular… What made you decide to invest your energy into this work in general?
Denisa Livingston: So, at that time, we saw many of the drinks in bigger quantities being served that were widely available, widely distributed, even at the grocery stores were at the forefront. When you enter the grocery store, you were not entering the space of the fresh fruits and vegetables, but you would be faced with these unhealthy foods and sodas stacked up for consumers to easily buy, for easy access, and easy reach. This was a big concern, because we knew it was cheap unhealthy food. We knew that it was cheap unhealthy drinks that made a culture code that we were scaling without knowing. We had a right to say that this is enough. We cannot have these sugary drinks at the forefront. We need to bring the fresh fruits and vegetables to the front. It is our right to be able to advocate for healthy food. We recognized that it wasn't only the adults drinking this, but also all the way down to the children who were drinking these sugary drinks. It was their breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Many times, and in many conversations that we've had, families were reliant on the cheap foods that were available and these drinks that were widely available all across the Navajo Nation. We needed to put a stop to that and really emphasize that it's causing harm to our bodies and also to our diets, and that it was never part of who we were before as Indigenous People.
This is important for us as we were navigating the conversation about food as medicine. We knew the sugary drinks and all of the foods that are attached to that type of habit was also something that people were not comfortable talking about. For example, we talked about it but we had to be in a very safe and inclusive conversation where folks knew that if they were going to be talking about this, they're also revealing that they may have an addiction to these foods. The depth and severity of what we were diving into we knew that it was not just one generation, it was multi-generational. The impacts of it have been continuing throughout. Really, there were there were no regulations or—even to this day no regulations about these types of unhealthy drinks and also foods where we live. It has been a great concern knowing that the consumption was very high when we look across our own people in our own population.
Kourtney Nham: So, with that recognition, I’m wondering if you can recall your first activity you remember doing to start really addressing the health effects of sugary drink consumption.
Denisa Livingston: So, with the team that I was working with, we are working on a grassroots level and still are working at that level. We started to do surveys—really getting insights about what people were thinking, if people were on the same page as us, and distributing those surveys. We were collecting the information at the grocery stores, or at that time, as much as we could, for those that have access to email or the website to fill out the survey, or even on social media. That was one activity that I remember that we were very nervous about, because you have a group of people that are advocating for more healthful opportunities, but at the same time we wanted to see if there's any solidarity in that or if people were very concerned like we were. Because we’ve seen the increase of diabetes and we've seen our own people suffer. We have those personal experiences with our family members who may have gone to very difficult challenges with their health, and even to the point of amputations of the foot or the leg that we've seen through these epidemics. We did complete those surveys, did get support, and people were in support of really bringing this awareness about and diving into what the communities thought about what was being served but also what was accessible as far as these food access points. That's the first activity that I remember.
Kourtney Nham: Yeah. I guess building off of that, do you mind talking a little bit more about other strategies you've used to address sugary drink consumption?
Denisa Livingston: We are the first organization to pass an unhealthy foods tax call the Healthy Diné Nation Act, and it was a 2% tax on unhealthy food and drinks. We have used many strategies, but one of the really important things is that we are looking at our cultural identity—that unhealthy foods were beginning to shape the identity of who we are and who we were, really taking a dominant narrative that we were unhealthy, and that we're very vulnerable to the health epidemics. We had to change that conversation. For example, we had to create the word with our community members of what unhealthy food or “junk food” is. We knew that there was junk, and we knew that there was food. There was no such thing as “junk food” since this unhealthy food did not exist in our diets before, we knew that we had to create a word. That word is ch’iyáán bizhool. And ch’iyáán means food, but bizhool means the scraps: the unhealthy food, the process food, the crap—the C.R.A.P. Carbonated Refined Artificial Processed foods, the prison food, and the food that contaminates our bodies, our immune systems, our identity.
And we had to scale that— those words that would be able to resonate with folks that knowing that, hey that we need to draw a line somewhere, but also we need to look at the empowering part of how do we change a conversation. The positive side of not only just looking at the negative impacts and the consequences of what we've done, but also look on the positive side. The Healthy Diné Nations Initiaves would be a hashtag, but also that healthy food is life. In Diné we say, ch’íyáán yá’át’éhégí dóó tó éí ííná át’é, and that means that this food is something that is holy, something that is sacred to us. We had to look at the conversation in a balance so that we're not only focused and driving the conversation on sugary beverages and the culture of that, but also we're looking at how, as Indigenous People, do we come out of this with resiliency and knowing that we have a greater purpose when it comes to our food waste and our food systems. Knowing that as advocates, as community members, as the Diné people, as Indigenous People, that we would have to make a turn somewhere or try to transition or start the conversations as we knew that this would be a tool, but also a vehicle to drive in the direction of food sovereignty and food traditionalism. That was one big strategy. Even to this day, we are still encouraging our community members to know that we need to protect and also promote and reclaim these food ways, especially to the time of COVID-19. With the hashtag #FoodIsMedicine, we are urging our community members to be able to not just go through this time, but grow through it. That food is medicine, and food is something that is something that we are able to use to be able to heal our bodies, to be able to heal some of the atrocities and the ailments, but also the historical trauma. And be able to address history, be able to address the present, but also create history for the future. Many strategies are very culturally related. Also, the leadership of this is something that we were ensuring that it was intergenerational, and the conversations were being led by the people.
Kourtney Nham: Wow. That was very powerful. I think there's so much to learn from the perspective and insight that you and your community really bring. Specifically, talking about sugar sweetened beverages are one thing, but it's about transformation of systems, which is I think kind of what you're touching on a little bit. But that's really great. I guess to pivot a little, although I think you've been talking about this a lot in all of your responses, but there's a rising focus on quote-unquote “health equity” in public health initiatives and activities, and I was wondering if you have some insight into how health equity can be authentically centered in soda tax policies and these strategies in general. Are there ways of doing this that you consider to be more effective than others?
Denisa Livingston: Yeah. So, one of the really critical conversations about this—and we've been in many discussions about health equity—and the lingo that we use, and the words that we use, that many times that community members don't use, these words. For us that are in public health—we use these—are health professionals. We're talking about this. But how do we turn those terminology into words, everyday words, of our community members, so that they're able to react, but also be a part and to be a participant of creating change. I believe we focus so much on the outcome of what strategies and what policies, and we need to step back and really connect with community, because I believe communities have many solutions and answers and frameworks that we have never thought about. And when it comes to ancestral practices, that we can incorporate and cultural practices and healing frameworks that can come from community members. When we're speaking about that, we also need to be thinking about that inclusion.
In our experience of this, being grassroots, many times, we are left out of conversations, because these conversations were happening in in a hospital board rooms, in private sector rooms, or in environments that did not include community or community members or even in academia. The community members were left out of these critical conversations. When we're talking about change, when we're talking about health equity, it is important that we also include the voices of the youth, the voices of the elders, the voices of those that would not ordinarily be in a college class or be on a webinar or be in these spaces where most of us do our work. We have to come out of that, and also see from the perspective—especially when they are suffering from these health-related illnesses and diseases and epidemics that they have personal engagements with the problems that we're speaking about. Oftentimes we don't get what solutions that they're trying to drive but also trying to voice. There are many voices that are crying out loud and yelling for help, but we don't hear them. They're so loud, but yet we don't hear those voices and hear those strategies or solutions.
And so, I believe that is one really critical aspect, especially when we're talking about, like I mentioned, ch’iyáán bizhool and ch’íyáán yá’át’éhégí, that comes from the people. That comes from the heart of the people. The work that is in collaboration with communities is very important as it is the lifeline of our work, and should be the lifeline of our work. Instead of eliminating and working in silos, that there has to be intersectionality, also interconnectedness. So, that we can be able to know that some of this—some of the resources and also the knowledge and the wisdom may not come out of textbooks, may not come out of our MPH or PhD programs, but it comes from grandma, it comes from grandpa, it comes from our parents. I think that is one really critical thing that seems to be lacking on this level, and I still advocate for this process when we're talking about these different strategies.
Kourtney Nham: That was great thank you so much for sharing that. To pivot again, the beverage industry is really aggressive and persistent in the way they resist policies that might limit their sales, especially when it comes to things like soda taxes. As I’m sure you're well aware, the beverage industry comes out really strong with a lot of messaging around this to bolster their side. For example, they make a lot of arguments about regressivity—that a soda tax will hurt people with lower incomes amongst many other things. I’m curious if you have a good counter message to this industry staple? And what is a good counter message that centers health equity?
Denisa Livingston: So, through our work, we've been able to switch that. Whenever there is talk about regressivity, it is important for us to quickly turn around and look at it from a positive perspective. When we're talking about soda taxes, it is important that we know that when they're implemented and enforced that the health outcomes are progressive. This is a huge turning point when we're looking at what is the outcome and also how does it empower our communities. When we're looking at our Healthy Diné Nation Act of 2014, this is something that we know that we've raised millions of dollars from the taxes to be able to fund community wellness projects. When we're looking at the outcomes of like, ‘hey although this is going to be something that we're fighting against and that may be difficult, what is it that we can do as a community to be able to improve the social and physical environments of our people despite having these issues?’ And we know that we're dealing with an addiction that many folks may not be able to step back and change their eating habits or their drinking habits right away, but what is that conversation that maybe will be able to change and also what are their counter arguments that we're able to do.
And when it comes to us as Indigenous People, the biggest thing is that these foods were never part of our diet. Sugar and flour were introduced when my people were sent on the Long Walk called, Hwééldi, and they were sent by the U.S. government to a concentration camp where these foods were introduced. And to this day, we are still fighting these foods. We're still reacting in a way that we're responding with weakness, because our bodies are not used to having these types of food in their system, in our system, and we're reacting in a very unhealthy way, because it is unhealthy. When we're giving our bodies unhealthy foods, then it is something that diminishes the health of our being. When we react this way, it is very concerning, and we see the consequences of it.
When we're talking about the health benefits being progressive regarding the taxation, we're looking at improving the environments of our people and also the opportunities. We now react in a in a very strong way, in a way that is strengthening our people, bringing healing, but also bringing an opportunity to talk about health and to talk about the history. To talk about where we have been in regards to what our ancestors went through, but also what are we doing now to address our life ways and food ways when it comes to this. The conversation when we're counter arguing is really just focusing on the sovereignty of who we are, on the rights, and also on the food apartheid and the injustices that have occurred. That—that is an impact. That is greater than trying to argue against the research, the conversations, the ads, or any of the information that may come out of these corporations. We know that it's heavily based on competition and also driving cheap unhealthy foods that are not empowering communities. But we've been able to do that in the opposite direction with our work.
Kourtney Nham: Yeah, that sounds like a very powerful, counter. I know you mentioned research in there, and I guess building off of this question, another thing that the beverage industry really likes to do is refute existing research and evidence against sugary drinks and make claims about how sugary drinks are the wrong targets. On advocate side in response to this, oftentimes there's a need to present robust research showing why this rhetoric and these claims are wrong. I’m curious if you have any thoughts about what the most pressing research need you see for advocates to continue to advance in their efforts to oppose industry claims. And yeah, if you have any thoughts about if there's research that needs to be done or if there's other priorities.
Denisa Livingston: We need more research coming out of Indian country when it comes to these types of topics, because as sovereign nations, we're able to implement laws and policies that may not be able to be as successful outside of Indigenous Nations. If we could continue to support the efforts in regards to Indigenous People and the life ways and food ways, but also the battle against these types of initiatives that are harmful to our communities, maybe we'll be able to further understand some of the frameworks, strategies, as well as the efforts in regards to the outcomes of what happens when we do implement traditional Indigenous foods and drinks. What are the alternatives of sugary beverages? What are the traditional drinks, for example, like Indigenous teas that maybe are naturally sweetened? What is the innovation of gastronomy when we're talking about taste education that we need to learn more about? What is the science of how do we empower ourselves how do we become a steward of biodiversity? Not only in our planting, not only in our kitchens, not only in what we're doing as far as bringing biodiversity into our communities and having increased access to healthy food, but also looking at what kind of drinks that we can create. We have been stewarded by our ancestors that all the alternatives of sugary drinks. Being a steward of biodiversity, that also would entail in our—on our plates, and also in our cups, right? What are we drinking, and then also on the palates of our tongue when we're looking at the science of what is healthy, what tastes healthy, and what do people think when they eat healthy food. Looking at that science in the tongue when we're talking about our own food, is there any increased interest when people eat our own healthy food or drink our own Indigenous teas—our own drinks that will be able to support our immune system and our health? What is the reaction on that? What can we learn from these experiences when we look from the perspective of growing our own food and supplying—our own drinks, on our tables, and in our homes? That we're able to practice sovereignty from the kitchen table, that we're not looking to the grocery store the convenience store that serves mostly unhealthful food, that now we're looking into our gardens.
Now we're looking into the ancestral practices, the knowledge, and the wisdom that exists from our families, and our grandmas, and our grandpas, and our ancestors. That we’re able to implement that, but also adapt and also be innovative, like you said… To be able to provide that information in a context of research is very critical. We tend to just focus on what are sugary drinks doing, what are the numbers, and what are the stats. Sometimes, those numbers are not talking about the narratives. Those numbers are not talking about the experiences and also the critical conversations that are happening inside homes when someone has diabetes or has experiencing the complications of diabetes when it comes to an amputation. Having the research focus more on the community level and the local level, and see what are those opportunities? How can we do research? And how can we highlight the innovation, but also the stewardship of what we're doing, and how we're doing it, and also how we're driving change? There is that need for collective power to be able to help one another, but also engage in research that is respectable and honorable and also inclusive with Indigenous People with communities instead of on behalf of communities. We need to be able to see that there's integrity when we do work with community members and seeing it from that aspect.
So, there are many ideas and conversations that need to occur just really unveiling who we are, and how we've been going through this, and what we see happening and or not happening in our communities. So, yes, there is a need for us to participate in these different activities to overcome what we're facing, but also to improve the health and well-being of our communities.
Kourtney Nham: That was so rich. You can't see me, but I was nodding my head vigorously the entire time you're talking. It’s incredible. It's such a unique and salient perspective that you bring. Yeah, but moving into one of our final questions… so you've been talking about a little bit I think in all of your responses what the vision for this work. I’m curious, for you, what does it look like when advocates like yourself win? And by that, I mean, what is the end game? What is the ideal outcome from this work and this organizing?
Denisa Livingston: So, we're addressing the root causes of where we are at this point and where we've been. We know that this work has to continue through generations. That training the next generations of health professionals, of public health advocates, of public health professionals, and everyone who is a participant of changing the unhealthful ways in our communities and creating better opportunities for people to have access to healthy food. It's important for us to see forward that the future generations, the future healthy generations, is the goal. If we know—we may not see that right now, we may not see it, I may not see it, you may not see it in this lifetime, but if it comes to the point where we do have future healthy generations, then we know that we can definitely celebrate. Because this work—I’m coming up almost on 10 years of doing this work. In this 10 years there's still a lot of work that needs to be done. There's still a lot of mentorship that needs to happen. There's still a lot of unveiling and unpacking of experiences, because sometimes that is re-traumatizing when we're talking about the experiences of our people, what they've been through, and just what we see our elders and the older generations visioning for us to come through this. To be able to do that, they also have to address the histories. We know that it is it is harmful, in a way, to step in those conversation, and it hurts our people, but we still have to managed to be able to tap into those visions, and tap into that knowledge. But also respect that maybe through this that there's healing, and then also that we're able to see the truth and unveil the truth, and maybe have some reconciliation activities. But know that these conversations have to happen in trust, and know that in time that we could maybe one day know that there will be healthy future generations.
In the midst of everything that we are doing, that we're not alone here. We are in the midst of our ancestors, our descendants, and future generations at this very moment. There's this integration of work that we see and we may not see, because of how heavy and how the efforts that that we're holding and stewarding. It's an accumulation of all these different experiences, atrocities, visions, and also strategies that we're trying to do all at one time. When we're facing food apartheid; and overwhelmed by the presence of processed food; and suffering from the diabetes epidemic, or the uranium contamination, or the colonized food waste. Despite this, we continue to work towards increasing our traditional ecological knowledge. Whole solutions from also our Diné language and culture. It's important that we continue to address and revitalize our food systems, increasing our food sovereignty efforts, protecting ancestral knowledge for the future generations. Also talking about this, and how food impacts climate change and sustainability. When we get to that point of addressing all these different things that we're talking about in this interview or in conversations with others, that maybe then we'll be able to celebrate. That's what we see as a vision. The Healthy Diné Nation, the hashtag that we use, that's also the vision too—is that, if one day, we could have a healthy Diné Nation like our ancestors once were with the adaptability and also the resiliency, maybe then we'll be able to celebrate.
Kourtney Nham: Thank you so much for sharing that. I think you really brought in so many of the connections between all the things that you talked about: food sovereignty, health, healing, environmental justice—just everything. That was beautiful. But before we finish off, I’m wondering if there's anything else you'd like to add that you feel wasn't covered.
Denisa Livingston: We can never leave out the conversation—we're talking about sugary drinks and the impacts of it, and the food economies, and the food system—is how that impacts the development in our teams. We have to be able to set those examples and be able to lead with integrity. We're setting the trend and also the example that we can change the culture code. For example, for us the many things that we've done among the strategies is that if ever we had to eat at a restaurant together as a team that we all ordered water. If there was lemon, if there were cucumbers that we could add we implemented as part of our culture code of our team. We did that very early on, because when we first started convening, we saw the sugary drinks on the tables, we saw that some of our team members were struggling with changing their drinking habits from diet sodas. But as we did it collectively, and as we did it with strength together, in community. If one person was diabetic, we all eat as a diabetic. Even in our families, even in my family, if we have someone who's diabetic, we don't say, ‘oh they're diabetic, and we eat this, or I drink this, you drink that.’ There's no separation. We do it together. There are no sodas that are in in my household and we don't have any sugary drinks, like fruit juices or anything—lemonade or any, you, know drinks that people may find refreshing—we don't have that. Whenever we have any convenience or any family gatherings, we're ensuring that we have naturally sweetened teas or teas that that have no sugar. As well as seeing that we are doing this together. How do we do that as a team, as an organization that we're not just implementing any policies or strategies without having to do that ourself. I think that is the conversation of being a steward of this work, but also knowing that we have a big responsibility. These stories, and the trends, and the topics, and the research— everything that we're doing—that it's not just a job or a calling, or a purpose. It comes with a responsibility, knowing that we have to be able to pass that forward to the next generations who are rising up into implementing helpful ways in our communities, but also worldwide. I think my last point is that—is that we have to be the examples.
Kourtney Nham: Thank you so much for adding that. I think that's a very important point. I’m so glad that you included that in this conversation. I again just want to thank you so much for joining and giving your insight and taking the time to do this. I know even just myself, from this conversation, have so much to reflect on and so much to think about. Every time you speak, it's always so powerful and so insightful, and I just—yeah.
Denisa Livingston: This is something the conversations I’ve had many times with my family, with our team, with my relatives. Living in the midst of food apartheid and trying to change this, there are many points but also times of strength and also times of sorrow that that happened. We're able to overcome, and to achieve, and to be successful, in in this short amount of time. But also knowing that we have a lot of work to do and being humble to that aspect. It is a big fight, and it takes social justice warriors to be able to overcome this. Together we can and then also having the patience and the diligence. But also knowing that the joy and the justice that exists in this work is the ultimate strength of who we are and how we can get through it together. So. thank you very much, Kourtney.
[Podcast outro tunes]
[In Praxis outro] Thank you for listening to this episode of In Praxis. We hope you all enjoyed it. Make sure to visit our website, www.thepraxisproject.org, where you can check out additional episodes of other guests as well as learn more about our work.
[End]