SustainaBold Podcast Rosalie Luo

Matthew Siegfried is a local historian in Michigan and has lived in Ypsilanti since 2001. He is a graduate of Eastern Michigan University with degrees in History and Historic Preservation. Much of his work has been on Ypsilanti’s local history and its connections to broad historical moments. He has focused on Ypsilanti’s rich Indigenous and Black history, and has produced a website (South Adams Street @ 1900) which details the development of Ypsi’s Black community.

In this episode, we discuss his journey that led him down the path of history, place-based education, relational perspectives, landscapes as the interfaces of society and nature, and the role of the collective in understanding our history. 

To read more about Matthew's work, check out the links below:

Visit Matthew's Facebook page and Website for South Adams Street @ 1900 Project

Hey everyone! Back again with Episode 9 for SustainaBold, this time with my guest Dharna Noor. She currently a staff writer for Earther at Gizmodo, covering all aspects of the climate crisis, like energy, biodiversity loss, and capitalism's inability to solve the crisis on its own. She also has an essay in "The World We Need: Stories and Lessons from America’s Unsung Environmental Movement," edited by Audrea Lim and published earlier this year in May. 

We talk about how she started her sustainability journey, in addition to the emotions related to reading and writing about the existential crises of our time. We talk about the climate crisis' connections to housing, labor, and the potential solutions that are just waiting for us to make those connections. Hope you enjoy the show, and check out her writings here! 


Dharna's Earther Profile 
Check out her essay in The World We Need
Follow Dharna on Twitter!

In Episode 8 of SustainaBold, I invited Alexis M. Wilson on the show to talk about her journey into Earth/Environmental Science, her experiences as a Black woman in STEM, and her current research interests and motivations!

After completing her undergraduate degree at Cornell, she’s now a second-year PhD student at Stanford University studying soil biogeochemistry, climate change, and environmental justice especially since the negative impacts of climate change and environmental degradation disproportionately impact communities of color and low-income communities. She’s begun investigating a variety of questions surrounding soil contamination in urban gardens, specifically in marginalized communities. Her mission is to create a more just, sustainable, and equitable world through scientific research and activism. As we discuss, her passion lies in combating environmental racism and climate injustices on local and global scales. She also hopes to increase the representation of Black women in STEM, particularly in the Earth and Environmental Sciences,

For more information on her work and engagement, check out these links below:


Visit her website here, which also includes blog posts and lots of other information about her work!
Follow her on Twitter and Instagram!

To kick off 2021, I spoke to Dr. Tiara Moore, an environmental ecologist, about how she became interested in ecology, her experiences as a Black woman in STEM, and how she’s helping to create a safe and inclusive workplace as founder of A WOC Space.

She completed her B.S at Winthrop University, received an M.S. in Biology at Hampton University, and earned her Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at UCLA. She’s currently a postdoctoral scholar at the University of Washington and The Nature Conservancy of Seattle where she is using soil environmental DNA to develop a biodiversity census of Ellsworth Forest to compare species diversity across management treatments over the past 10 years.  Check out her amazing research and engagement both inside and outside the lab, including her work as founder of #BlackinMarineScience!


Visit Dr. Moore’s website,

Visit A WOC Space,

Follow Dr. Moore’s Twitter for updates,

Check out her podcast, We Danglin!

Welcome Dr. Britt Wray, the 6th guest on SustainaBold! We had an engaging conversation around different mechanisms to enable internal activism or emotional intelligence especially around the climate and greater ecological crisis. We also discussed how her interdisciplinary background informs her approach and writing. One of my favorite insights from the conversation is that finding others that you can connect with over these emotions is a strengthening and empowering mechanism for dealing with uncertainty. Get ready for a deep dive!

Britt Wray, PhD is a broadcaster and author researching the social and ethical entanglements of science and technology, with a focus on the planetary health crisis and synthetic biology. Britt has a PhD in science communication from the University of Copenhagen and is the author of Rise of the Necrofauna: The Science, Ethics and Risks of De-Extinction (Greystone Books 2017). She has hosted several podcasts, radio & TV programs with the BBC and CBC, and is a TED Resident. Currently, Britt is writing a book about the mental health impacts of the climate and wider eco-crisis, which will be published by Knopf-Random House. Check out her newsletter on this (Gen Dread)! It’s a wonderful resource for us all.

Links:


Visit her website: https://www.brittwray.com/
Subscribe to her newsletter, Gen Dread: https://gendread.substack.com/
Follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/brittwray


Articles we discussed from her newsletter:


What's wrong with the term "climate anxiety"? https://gendread.substack.com/p/whats-wrong-with-the-term-climate
Why activism isn’t *really* the cure for eco-anxiety and eco-grief: https://gendread.substack.com/p/why-activism-isnt-really-the-cure
The power of meaning-focused coping: https://gendread.substack.com/p/the-power-of-meaning-focused-coping
Caroline Hickman’s work: https://www.carolinehickmantherapy.com/
Renee Lertzman’s work: https://reneelertzman.com/

Welcome to the fifth episode of SustainaBold, a podcast on sustainability from an interdisciplinary perspective. On this show, I interview guests who work professionally or personally in sustainability, and I ask them why they're motivated and what they're doing in their lives to create a more sustainable future.

This time, my guest is Meg Ruttan Walker, who's a writer, teacher, mom, climate activist, and organizer in the Waterloo region.

We talk about why she cares about sustainability, how she became involved in organizing, and how she's navigating the climate crisis. We discuss a variety of topics, including trauma as related to climate grief, justice and redistribution of power, and the terrifying elements of eco-fascism plus how to counter them.

Check out her amazing WordPress site called A Variety of Meltdowns, where she details her own emotions and responses of the climate crisis that many of us also experience. For instance, she has written about radical vulnerability, no absolution and necessary conditions for hope. Hope you enjoy the show!

Keep updated with her on Twitter!