Josh Levine, Land Laureate Institute
Joah
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Areas of Focus
Permaculture
(1749 people) | Alternative Medicine
(1813 people) | Domesticated Animal Diversity
(239 people) | Environmental Education
(2164 people) | Natural Resource Education
(848 people) | Art and Sculpture
(1034 people) | Wildlife Habitat Conservation
(1461 people) | Practical Conservation
(639 people) | Wilderness
(1251 people) | Organic Farming
(2095 people) | Wildlife Ecology
(1052 people) | Agroecology
(688 people) | Sustainability, Religious and Spiritual Issues
(1806 people) | Land Stewardship
(1156 people) | Biodiversity Conservation
(1843 people) | Conservation Biology
(557 people) | Ethnobotany
(624 people) | Ecopsychology
(893 people) | Biomimicry
(1122 people) | Indigenous People and Culture
(1804 people)
About
I am the founder of the Land Laureate, a nonprofit that honors individuals who embody an "intimate knowledge of the land", and who cultivate mutually beneficial relationships between their human and their local, wild plant and animal communities.
I am also a Resident Land Partner at Edge Land Farm, 24 acres of beautiful, mostly wild land that borders the Green Valley and Astascadero Creeks near Graton, California. At Edge Land Farm, I raise rare breed sheep, and maintain a demonstration herb garden, where I occasionally teach an apprenticeship program in herbal medicine.
I am also a Resident Land Partner at Edge Land Farm, 24 acres of beautiful, mostly wild land that borders the Green Valley and Astascadero Creeks near Graton, California. At Edge Land Farm, I raise rare breed sheep, and maintain a demonstration herb garden, where I occasionally teach an apprenticeship program in herbal medicine.
What is a Land Laureate?
A Land Laureate is an individual who through life experience and study has accumulated a storehouse of knowledge about the workings of the land, and of the relationships between the people and the local, wild plants and animals. Through extraordinary skills of observation, empathy, and creative imagination, these individuals have attained a high level of knowledge and understanding of appropriate, sustaining, respectful ways to engage with animals, plants and the living land. These Land Laureates are holders of a practical and spiritual land-based knowledge that our culture is sorely in need of learning. The Land Laureate Institute seeks to bring these spokespeople and their perspectives into the greater cultural arena.
The Land Laureate Program
Traditional cultures have often recognized individuals within their communities who have a special understanding of the existent (and possible) social relationships between their human communities and the surrounding animal and plant communities. These individuals are often given honorific titles and held in great esteem in their communities. In other cultures, a person who mediates between the human and natural world might be called a shaman, a kahuna or a guardbosque. There is no analogous title and job description in our own culture. The Land Laureate Institute will institutionalize this practice of conferring respect upon these individuals, and listening to their wisdom within our own culture.
Modeled loosely after the Poet Laureate program, a committee of distinguished advisors will nominate and select individual Land Laureates on regional, state and national levels. Each Land Laureate will serve for a term of two years, during which time they will act as spokesperson for their land and the people, animals and plants who inhabit their home lands. Along with their title (i.e. Sonoma County Land Laureate, California Land Laureate, U.S. Land Laureate), they will be awarded a monetary prize. This honorarium will allow the Laureates to spend time traveling and speaking on behalf of their constituencies, discussing the environmental and social issues affecting their regions.
The Land Laureate program creates a highly visible public podium from which the Land Laureates may educate the general population about the places in which they live, and how they may better care for them. In addition, the existence of Land Laureate Institute and the Laureates sends a strong message to adults and children alike about the importance and value of studying the land, animals and plants where one lives. It is this relational knowledge that allows us to appropriately and respectfully care for, and protect the land and all of its inhabitants.
The Land Laureate Program
Traditional cultures have often recognized individuals within their communities who have a special understanding of the existent (and possible) social relationships between their human communities and the surrounding animal and plant communities. These individuals are often given honorific titles and held in great esteem in their communities. In other cultures, a person who mediates between the human and natural world might be called a shaman, a kahuna or a guardbosque. There is no analogous title and job description in our own culture. The Land Laureate Institute will institutionalize this practice of conferring respect upon these individuals, and listening to their wisdom within our own culture.
Modeled loosely after the Poet Laureate program, a committee of distinguished advisors will nominate and select individual Land Laureates on regional, state and national levels. Each Land Laureate will serve for a term of two years, during which time they will act as spokesperson for their land and the people, animals and plants who inhabit their home lands. Along with their title (i.e. Sonoma County Land Laureate, California Land Laureate, U.S. Land Laureate), they will be awarded a monetary prize. This honorarium will allow the Laureates to spend time traveling and speaking on behalf of their constituencies, discussing the environmental and social issues affecting their regions.
The Land Laureate program creates a highly visible public podium from which the Land Laureates may educate the general population about the places in which they live, and how they may better care for them. In addition, the existence of Land Laureate Institute and the Laureates sends a strong message to adults and children alike about the importance and value of studying the land, animals and plants where one lives. It is this relational knowledge that allows us to appropriately and respectfully care for, and protect the land and all of its inhabitants.