From Individual to Interwoven

As requested by you - my dear readers! - in a recent poll, I’ve adapted the content below from an essay I wrote on Dr. Mary Graham, a notable Aboriginal Indigenous scholar. Her scholarship provides insights into human interactions that may guide us toward a more holistic and humane future in education.

Many of us sense an urgent need for an education system that is truly “future-proof”—one that helps the next generations balance caring for the natural environment with a concern for human achievement. This is precisely where the insights of Aboriginal scholar Mary Graham matter. A Kombumerri and Wakka Wakka thinker, she challenges the Western assumption that “humanness” is merely a given. Instead, it is a deliberately cultivated skill, requiring us to forge deep connections with land, family, and community. She calls this the “custodial ethic.”

Could an ethic emphasizing land stewardship divert attention from human needs? Graham suggests that caring for the environment is inseparable from caring for one another—land, family, and community are woven together, not competing entities. By re-centering education on the idea that humans and the natural world are intimately connected, Graham frames land not as a resource but as a living entity that teaches and nurtures. In turn, our reciprocal responsibility ensures that human flourishing and environmental stewardship are complementary, not contradictory.

This ecocentric perspective contrasts sharply with most typical modern Western modern models of learning, where “success” often means high individual test scores. Under Graham’s custodial ethic, the real measure is how we sustain each other—including nonhuman beings. Each act of land-tending (or “repetitive action,” as Graham calls it) teaches empathy, humility, and reciprocity. These behaviors, when practiced regularly, become second nature, shaping how students see themselves and the world around them. (See similar ideas in Indigenous scholar Leanne Betasamosake Simpson’s work).

Graham’s ideas resonate with Harvard professor Junlei Li’s contemporary research on “simple interactions.” Li focuses on small, everyday moments of engagement—a warm greeting, a shared laugh, a moment of attentive listening—that are crucial for healthy child development. Li’s emphasis on relational micro-connections mirrors Graham’s ethic of ongoing, relational care. Daily interactions act as “active ingredients,” fostering both psychological well-being and a sense of belonging—whether to a human community or to the living landscape.

Why should we pay attention to these ideas in the technological age? In many Indigenous communities, the “apocalypse”—defined as cultural upheaval and environmental breakdown—has already happened multiple times in the form of genocide, forced migration, socio-political upheaval, etc. Yet they have continued to live in harmony with their surroundings for millennia. Indigenous scholars like Graham have made enormous efforts to translate these lessons into Western academic terms, offering an alternative worldview that offers powerful insights for navigating ecological and social crises. This is not a call to appropriate Indigenous culture, but rather an invitation to learn from ancient human knowledge systems that have weathered profound disruption and still insist on the inseparability of environmental and human well-being.

In Graham’s vision, to be “more and more human” means to hone our capacity for mutual care. She nudges education away from siloed achievements and toward an interwoven model where academic rigor coexists with ecological commitment. By recognizing land, water, and fellow inhabitants—both human and nonhuman—as partners in life, we cultivate students who see responsibility as inseparable from knowledge. This shift doesn’t abandon progress; it redefines it, making future generations better equipped to adapt to an evolving world while preserving the bonds that keep us fully human. I believe that by embracing Indigenous perspectives, we expand our notion of what education can and should be, ensuring that both humans and the planet flourish together.

Recommended resources

• Indigenous philosophy and 'Relationist Economics' with Mary Graham. Skip to 5:11. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8afvrlkpxy4

• Graham, M. (1999). Some thoughts about the philosophical underpinnings of Aboriginal worldviews. Worldviews: Environment, Culture, Religion, 3, 105–118.