Essay Article review: a tapestry of brown and green

Words: 1214
Pages: 5

Article Review
A tapestry of browns and greens
Tu K Ly
Devry University

The article “A Tapestry Of Browns And Greens” was written by Nalini Nadkarni, a pioneering canopy ecologist and professor at The Evergreen State College. This article describes a rich tapestry of personal stories, information, and illustrations, from science to symbol, culture, and religion. Nalini used the metaphor of a tapestry that composed of different colored threads to reflect on her life, as she also came from the vividly mixed ethnic background of her Indian/Hindu and Brooklyn/Jewish parents. She then described how her particular tapestry weaves threads of religion, art, and social justice with her work as a

She and her students create the “Treetop Barbie Doll” to encourage young women to be interested in forest science and designed tree art stickers that are affixed to skateboards to remind the youthful users that trees are connected to what provides them their daily pleasure. To explore the political values, Nalini created the “Legislature Aloft” project, in which she invited twelve state legislators and their aides to come and discuss about forest management issues, government funding of science, the reasons for high biodiversity in the canopy, and the importance of non-vascular plants in forest nutrient cycles. To connect the urban youth with science and fieldwork, Nalini invited a young rapper named C.A.U.T.I.O.N. to come out to the field to sing about the trees, clams, and bugs to the middle school children from Tacoma, Washington, which also opened her eyes to the many colors of nature that the students saw with fresh eyes in the familiar forest of her own college campus. Nalini’s love for trees led to her curiosity about how different cultures and religions assign spiritual values to trees. By scouring religious texts and visiting different religions’ places of worship, she discovered that Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism value trees for both practical and spiritual reasons. Furthermore, she realized that science and religion didn’t have to conflict but rather could be