Recent Michigan State University College of Arts & Letters graduate Mikayla Thompson, who is a descendant of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, is educating others about Indigenous farming practices and culture through the gardens she helped create and now leads at MSU’s W.J. Beal Botanical Garden and the Nokomis Cultural Heritage Center in Okemos, Michigan.

This past spring, Thompson, who graduated from Michigan State University in December 2023 with a B.A. in Linguistics and a minor in Indigenous Studies, helped establish a Four Sisters Garden at Beal Botanical Garden and a Three Sisters Garden at the Nokomis Cultural Heritage Center.

Thompson became involved in the project while working as a graduate assistant for Laurie Thorp, Ph.D., director of the MSU Residential Initiative on the Study of the Environment and co-founder of the Student Organic Farm. The Student Organic Farm had received a $50,000 grant from the Organic Valley Foundation to support Indigenous Foodways.

In collaboration with the Native American Institute and College Assistance Migrant Program (CAMP), Thorp and her team recruited undergraduate and graduate students to work on establishing indigenous food plots designed to teach students about organic farming, revitalizing traditional ways of farming, and planting traditional foods that provided sustenance for our indigenous people for thousands of years.

The three sisters method is a form of companion planting where crops of corn, beans, and squash, known as the three sisters, are planted together and support each other, creating optimal growing conditions. This method is attributed to the Haudenosaunee peoples, also known as the Iroquois, of the Eastern Great Lakes and is now used across the continent.

“The corn provides support to the beans that grow upwards. The beans provide nitrogen to the soil, and the squash provides protection from small predators such as rabbits. In some communities, they also grow sunflowers, amaranth, or another crop and so it is sometimes referred to as the four sisters,” Thompson said. “These crops have sustained these communities for thousands of years.”

The Three Sisters Garden initially was planned as an addition to the Student Organic Farm at MSU until Thompson suggested changing the location to the Nokomis Cultural Heritage Center to provide easier access for Indigenous community members. Alan Prather, Associate Professor in the College of Natural Science, then collaborated with Thompson to plant a Four Sisters plot in Beal Botanical Garden.

“This project has created an opening to begin working with Tribal youth and Nations at reestablishing their food sovereignty,” said NAI Director Kevin Leonard. “I am hopeful that the NAI and SOF can continue to collaborate and expand this effort to possibly one day include an Indigenous seed bank for our Tribal Nations to draw from.”

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“We all have a responsibility to maintain good relationships with every being on this Earth, and to me, honoring that responsibility means protecting the cultural diversity of this planet for future generations to experience and participate in.” - Mikayla Thompson

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Educating Others About Indigenous Culture

In addition to the planting of these gardens, Thompson created a series of workshops honoring Indigenous culture and the three sisters/four sisters method. The first workshop took place in April at both garden locations and featured an overview of the three sisters/four sisters growing method and its history as well as traditional site preparation for planting.

The preparation of the garden plot is an important part of the three sisters/four sisters method and can vary from tradition to tradition, but the general idea remains the same. The garden is arranged in circular formations with mounds throughout. Each mound houses an outer ring of corn, an inner ring of beans, and a squash plant at the center. All preparation is done in a clockwise orientation, mimicking the Anishinaabe teachings surrounding the Medicine Wheel. When entering the garden, one enters from the eastern direction where the sun rises, symbolizing beginnings and new things.

In addition, traditional songs are usually sung as the garden plot is prepared to honor the site. At the Beal location, for example, Nichole Keway Biber, a Tribal citizen of the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians (Waganakising Odawa) and the Mid-Michigan Campaign Organizer for Clean Water Action, who also has a Ph.D. in English from MSU, sang the Anishinaabe Water Song as the Four Medicines were laid down: tobacco, cedar, sweetgrass, and sage.

“Traditional songs hold deep significance in many cultures, including Indigenous American communities,” Thompson said. “Many songs for us are about honoring something by showing gratitude. Gratitude is a small but necessary act in being in reciprocal relationship with the world.”

The workshop also featured hands-on sweetgrass braiding, which is a culturally significant activity to many Great Lake communities. It involves braiding strands of sweetgrass together, either with a partner or alone.

“To the Anishinaabe, sweetgrass is Mother Earth’s hair, so to braid it is to maintain a reciprocal relationship with her,” Thompson said. “To braid a loved one’s hair can be a sign of respect and unconditional love.”

Nishinaabemowin and Tsalagi plant names, which are an important part of honoring Indigenous traditions and communities, also were discussed during the workshop.

“The significance of utilizing the language in your everyday life is that it is an act of resistance and a testament to Indigenous resiliency,” Thompson said. “Because we very nearly lost our languages, to speak them is a means of honoring that history as well as the struggle of our ancestors.”

The names discussed at the workshop include:

Nishinaabemowin:

• Corn – Mdaamin
• Beans – Mskwaadiisminak/Mskodiisminak
• Squash – Kosmaan
• Sunflowers – Giiso-Waa’aaskoneh

Tsalagi:

• Corn – Selu
• Beans – Tuya
• Squash – Wagiga
• Sunflowers – Nvdadikani

More Three Sisters/Four Sisters workshops were planned, including a Green Corn Celebration in July, a Harvest Celebration in September, and a canning and preserving workshop in the fall.

The Green Corn Ceremony honored the Cherokee tradition of tasseling corn and featured a feast and storytelling. The Harvest Celebration included a feast and crop harvesting. A portion of the harvest will be distributed to some elders and community members; the rest will be saved for processing in the final workshop. Lastly, the canning and processing workshop was planned to explore the native tradition of processing a crop yield so that it lasts through winter.

Protecting Cultural Diversity

The workshops, the gardens, and the community building all serve as stepping stones to Thompson’s wider mission – to provide pathways for people to connect to what was nearly lost.

“Our cultures, our languages, and our ways of life were almost eradicated, and so to be able to practice these teachings is very meaningful to me,” Thompson said. “At the core of what it means to be Indigenous is to foster relationships with those around you, whether that be in your community or with our more-than-human relatives, such as at the garden.”

Thompson is grateful to all those who have helped bring this project to fruition.

“I would like to thank Jorhie Beadle, Laurie Thorpe, and Darby Anderson from the MSU Student Organic Farm for supporting our communities and uplifting Indigenous voices. I would like to thank everybody at the Nokomis Cultural Heritage Center for being steady support throughout the entire process and helping us whenever they could. I would also like to thank Nichole Keway Biber for being my incredible gardening partner – she has taught me valuable ancestral teachings and life lessons,” Thompson said. “My colleagues at Beal have been amazing at re-centering the narrative around our understanding of botanical knowledge and acknowledging the very long history of traditional Indigenous botanical knowledge as well. The process of this garden has been utterly life changing!”

Thompson first connected with the group at Beal Botanical Garden through the 2023 Nurture Your Roots poetry contest, which she won with her poem, sacred roots. She also volunteers at the Nokomis Cultural Heritage Center and is a camp coordinator for a youth- and family-focused Nishinaabemowin Language Camp that teaches the Nishinaabemowin language through culturally significant methods.

“We all have a responsibility to maintain good relationships with every being on this Earth, and to me, honoring that responsibility means protecting the cultural diversity of this planet for future generations to experience and participate in,” Thompson said. “There is beauty in our heritages, cultures, and languages!”

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Story includes content originally published by the College of Arts and Letters