TERRY TEMPEST WILLIAMS on Sacred Rage and the Battle for Public Lands ⌠ENCORE⌡ /233
Photo of red sandstones pushing skyward from a vast expanse of desert floor beneath gradient blue sky in Tsé Biiʼ Ndzisgaii (Valley of the Rocks), Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park along the border of Utah and Arizona; Photo by Gautier Salles.
This week’s encore episode, originally broadcast in October of 2017, invites insight into renewed relational understanding of home, sacred rage, and protecting the breathing spaces of public lands.
Terry Tempest Williams guides us to explore acts of the imagination as we shift into consciousness and expand our sense of family to both human and wild. As so many of us grapple with the omnipresent question of “what do we do?”, Terry provides us with salve through stories of the beauty and power of our gifts, and the living histories of the Great Basin and Colorado Plateau.
Terry Tempest Williams has been called "a citizen writer," a writer who speaks and speaks out eloquently on behalf of an ethical stance toward life. A naturalist and fierce advocate for freedom of speech, she has consistently shown us how environmental issues are social issues that ultimately become matters of justice.
“My sense of family is not just exclusive to my own species.”
Photo of Terry Tempest Williams by Kwaku Alston
Williams, like her writing, cannot be categorized. She has testified before Congress on women’s health issues, been a guest at the White House, has camped in the remote regions of Utah and Alaska wildernesses and worked as "a barefoot artist" in Rwanda. Known for her impassioned and lyrical prose, Terry Tempest Williams is the author of the environmental literature classic, Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place; An Unspoken Hunger: Stories from the Field; Desert Quartet; Leap; Red: Patience and Passion in the Desert; and The Open Space of Democracy. Her most recent book is The Hour of Land: A Personal Topography of America’s National Parks.
In 2015, She and her husband, Brooke Williams, purchased BLM oil and gas leases in Utah as conservation buyers. They divide their time between Castle Valley, Utah and Jackson Hole, Wyoming.
♫ Music featured in this episode includes “The Cosmos and the Canyon” (Instrumental) by Buffalo Rose, “To the Bison” by Kendra Swanson, and “Lång Väg Hem” by Aviva le Fey.
Episode References
Staying with the Trouble by Donna Haraway
Yosemite’s Sequoias have a vital message. Listen to them, urges Terry Tempest Williams
We aim to be a gathering place for ideas and solutions ensuring that the growing body of work that we steward remains accessible to the public. If you want to see us continue, or perhaps are especially moved by the episode you are listening to today, please become a monthly sustaining member through our Patreon or consider making a one-time donation directly to us through our website. To stay up-to-date on our work, sign up for our newsletter.
For The Wild is a slow media organization dedicated to land-based protection, co-liberation, and intersectional storytelling. We are rooted in a paradigm shift away from human supremacy, endless growth, and consumerism. As we dream towards a world of grounded justice and reciprocity, our work highlights impactful stories and deeply-felt meaning making as balms for these times.