Dwellin’ In The Marsh

Some tribal owned grocers that ship:

Bow and Arrow (Ute Mountain)

Native Harvest (White Earth)

Red Lake Fishery (Red Lake)

Wozupi (Mdewakanton Dakota)

Ramona Farms (Gila River)

Tanka Bars (Oglala)

Indian Pueblo Store (Pueblos)

Twisted Cedar Wine (Cedar Paiutes)

Ute Bison (Ute)

Seka Hills Olive Oil and Vinegars (Yocha Dehe Wintun)

She Nah Nam Seafood (Nisqually)

Sakari Botanicals (Inupiaq)

Honor the Earth (? Anishinaabe)

Nett Lake Wild Rice (Boise Forte Anishinaabe)

Passamaquoddy maple (Passamaquoddy)

BONUS: coffee :)

Yeego Coffee (Navajo)

Spirit Mountain Roasting (Yuma Quechan)

Birchbark Coffee (Anishinaabe)

Honor the Earth is an organization founded by Winona Duke of the White Earth Nation (Anishinaabe/Ojibwe) with Amy Ray and Emily Saliers (LGBTQ musical duo Indigo Girls and long-time political activists.) You can buy Honor The Earth merch online to support the environmental work they do, specifically to help protest Enbridge Oil’s Line 3 Pipeline routed through tribal lands that endangers wild rice beds which are both a staple crop and sacred to Anishinaabeg.

However, Winona also heads up a hemp farm called Winona’s Hemp & Heritage Farm located on and run primarily by members of the White Earth Nation. It seeks to general local wealth for the tribe by encouraging the production of hemp as a fast-growing renewable and regenerative crop resource to be used for everything from non-plastic textiles/clothing, housing construction and insulation, food products, and CBD products! (They also grow other crops there such as heirloom varieties of corn, beans, squash, Jerusalem artichokes, potatoes, and ceremonial tobacco in an effort to help re-establish and increase tribal food sovereignty!)

They have both a brick-and-mortar shop called The Hemp Market Store and Coffee Shop in Osage MN where they sell their products and others by Indigenous-owned & -run companies! (They also sell those seasonal tribal heirloom crops there including Lakota squash and Ojibwe purple potatoes.)

it looks like some shops’ products are seasonal and arent avaliable at this time of year (november 2023), but it may be at a different season

new or fixed links in green with ✳️ emoji inactive/closed website in red with ⛔️ emoji

Grocers: from salamanderinspace’s reblog of product list

Bow and Arrow –> Cornmeal, Polenta

Native Harvest –> Maple Syrup, Plum Syrup, Coffees, Jewelry

✳️Red Lake Fishery –> fish (Walleye, Perch, Crappie, Northern, Whitefish, Smoked Fish)

✳️Nawapo (formerly Red Lake Nation Foods) –> Mixes & Batters, Teas & Coffee, Fruit spreads, Wild Rice, Personal care, Handcrafted gifts

Wozupi –> seasonal produce [no online ordering right now]

Ramona Farms –> Beans, Wheat Berries, Whole Wheat Flour, Corn Meal Products, Grits, Pinole, Chickpeas/Garbanzo beans

Tanka –> Buffalo-cranberry snacks [no online ordering right now]

✳️Indian Pueblo Store –> Housewares, Apparel, Mugs, Jewelry, Decor, Baked goods mix, etc

Twisted Cedar Wine –> Wine

Ute Bison –> Bison jerky sticks, skulls, and robes

Seka Hills –> Olive Oil, Wine, Vinegar, Nuts, Beef jerky, Honey, Body Care / Soaps, Pickled Asparagus

⛔️She Nah Nam –> [website is closed]

Sakari Farms –> Hotsauce, Tea, Seasonings, Lotions, Medicinal herbs & oils, Squash Candy

Honor the Earth –> [see the reblog above]

✳️Nett Lake Wild Rice –> Wild rice (website features recipes)

✳️Passamaquoddy maple –> Maple products (syrup, sugar, candies), Pancake and muffin mix, Seasoning

✳️Ioway Bee Farm (Iowa, recommended by watcherscrown) –> Honey, Lotions, Lip balm, Beeswax, Candles, CBD products, Honey sticks

Online retailer: partnered with some of the grocers in the list above, so you can order several grocers’ products from 1 place

✳️Tocabe (Osage, recommended by killmecoward) –> Pantry food staples

✳️Indigenous First (recommended by pingnova) –> Handmade crafts/art, Foods & Teas, Personal care, Decor, Seeds, Books, Jewelry supplies

✳️SweetGrass Trading Company (Winnebago, recommended by watcherscrown) –> Handmade crafts/art, Foods (of note: Salmon), Coffee & teas, Personal care, Books (website features recipes)

Coffee/Tea:

Yeego Coffee

✳️Spirit Mountain Roasting

Birchbark Coffee

Thunder Island Coffee

✳️Owl Lightning Coffee (Ute (?), recommended by c4-magic)

Bow & Arrow Brand, Ute Mountain Tribe

Native Harvest, White Earth Band (wild rice recipes)

Ramona Farms, Gila River (bean/corn-based recipes)

Sweetgrass Trading Co., Winnebago Tribe

Student: I can’t find any scholarly articles on this subject!

Me: Okay, what’s the subject?

Student: Creating a culture of sharing in west-coast technological companies.

Me: Alright, and what/where have you tried searching?

Student: I searched “creating a culture of sharing in west-coast technological companies” on the library website!

Me:

And don’t say “they should have learned in [previous level of university education].” Do you think every person continues education within a few years of their first degree? THEY DON’T. Even if they did get a then-good introduction to research, you think nothing changed between 2008 and 2018? How about the doctoral student I met today whose last degree–and last experience with academic libraries–was in 1996? How about the guy in my master’s cohort who got his bachelor’s degree in 1987?

Because look. See that very specific topic the student wanted? There may or may not be actual scholarly articles about it. But here are a few things you can do:

First, zoom out. Start broad. Pick a few phrases or keywords, like “tech companies” and “culture.” See what comes up.

Actually, back up. First, does your library’s website search include articles, or do you have to go into a database? My library’s website searches some of our 200+ databases, but not all. And you’ll need to find (in advance search or adjustable limiters that pop up after your initial search) how to limit your search to scholarly and/or peer-reviewed articles.

What other keywords are related or relevant? For the search above, you could use a combination of “silicon valley,” “company/ies” or “organization/s,” “sharing,” “collaborative,” “workplace culture,” “social culture,” “organizational culture,” and those are just the ones I can come up with off the top of my head.

Did you find something that looks promising? Great! What kind of subjects/keywords are attached (usually to the abstract, sometimes in the description section of the online listing)? Those can give you more ideas of what to search. Does it cite any articles? Look at those! Some databases (ilu ProQuest) will also show you a selection of related/similar articles.

If you’re researching a very specific topic, you may not find any/many articles specifically about your subject. You may, for example, have to make do with some articles about west-coast tech companies’ work cultures, and different articles about creating sharing/collaborative environments.

And here’s what I’ve got to add:  

Ask a Librarian

Seriously guys librarians are here to help. We would love to help you find the right resource for your particular informational need and we’ve been trained to do so as efficiently and effectively as possible. Nowadays you don’t even have to go to the library in person as many libraries offer online chat services as well as the option to contact via email. Further, and I think very importantly we are dedicated to our patrons rights to privacy. To quote the American Library Association the “rights of privacy are necessary for intellectual freedom and are fundamental to the ethics and practice of librarianship.”  

Search the Stacks

This is one of my favorite ways  to immerse myself in an area of study. While a good subject or keyword search will lead you to some good results sometimes is just as fruitful to go the library and plunk yourself down in section and browse all the books in a topic area. Libraries will label the (book)stacks based on whichever classification system they use and you can use the links below to figure out which area of the stacks you’ll want to look through.

Dewey: used in public libraries

LOC /Library of Congress: classification system used in university libraries

http://www.usg.edu/galileo/skills/unit03/libraries03_04.phtml

Online Books

Some websites like gutenberg project are dedicated to making public domain books accessible to the public. Using the search term public domain books is a good way to go about looking for more sources of them. Open sourced is another good term to use when trying to find freely accessible books online and that’s not just limited to fiction books but textbooks are also offered by various sites.

Project Gutenberg is an online archive of tens of thousands of  books that have enter the public domain that can be freely accessed.

Openstax is one website that provides access to Higher Ed and AP open sourced textbooks.

Libguides and Pathfinders

As stated above librarians are in the business of connecting people to resources. If we can’t do so in person then we also do so by creating guides that can be found and used when we aren’t around. These guides are filled with search terms, books, articles, reviews, lists, links, and anything else we think would be helpful for patrons trying to explore a particular topic area. 

Pathfinder is a particular term used for these guides. Libguides is a particular platform which to host these guides. Using either word at the end of your search terms online will bring up guides that have been created in that particular subject area. Or you can explore libguides directly with your search terms to find what guides librarians across the country have created.

Note: Using pathfinder in your search terms may pull up resources about Paizo Publishing’s same titled tabletop RPG series and while dragons are cool you can modify your search to library pathfinder to exclude these resources.

Other than using a search engine or libguides directly I find a great many pathfinders on university library sites. Usually what I do is find a university’s library webpage, find their pathfinder/research guides/guides section, and then browse through their lists of guides. These are generally organized by field of study so just pick the one you are interested in and look through the resources they have listed.

Some of the resources will be accessible for anyone while some might be locked for students of the particular university.  If the article, book, or resource is locked by a school portal you can either search for it online outside of the university portal or you can go to your own university/public library to see if they have access to the resource there. Even if they don’t have it currently in their collection libraries are often connected with other branches and may be able to request an interlibrary loan of what you need.

Online Reference Resources

Sometimes the problem isn’t finding information but finding good information. Below are two sites that I use regularly to help me with this issue when searching online for resources.

The Reference and User Services Association of the American Library Association gives a list of the best free reference sites on the internet

The Ipl2 is a good authoritative source to find general information on a variety of topics. Even though the website is no longer updating there are still a plethora of subject guides that can be explored.

Open Sourced Journals and Articles

Just as there are open sourced books and textbooks so too are there open sourced journals and articles available. Again  you can add the term open sourced when searching for these resources.

DOAJ is the Directory of Open Access Journals and you can search through here to find both articles and journals freely available to access.

Journal Article Tips

Finally whenever I’m searching through journal articles there are a few things I always like to keep in mind.

Build context. Once you find an article that is relevant to your search you can do this by exploring the citations. Both those that the article you are using references in its bibliography and those that reference the article itself. 

Every database is going to do this differently but generally with a few clicks you can find out who has cited an article that you have read. If nothing else try popping the title of your article into google scholar and you’ll see a blue ‘Cited by’ below the description. Also in some cases you can click on the author directly in a database to see what else they have written in the subject. Totally ask your librarian for help navigating the particular database you are using again they will be stoked to do so. 

Building this context of literature by finding and reading these extra articles is important to building a critical understanding of your topic and will allow you to build the best possible defense of your arguments. This will also allow you to see if the article you’ve initially selected is in itself a viable position or if it is an outlier of its field.

In an average day, I see seven to eight students. Half of them are there, having booked a full hour, for what they think will be this monumental task. It takes me maybe fifteen minutes to teach them how to use key words, what and where the databases are, and the differences between the types.

I wish it were just the freshies, but it’s not. I’ve had students in grad programs coming in for help because their professors won’t allow them to Google sources. I’ve started making a point to run through how to use the databases during my class visits to let students know about tutoring services. And don’t get me started on how many students think ASKING OUR RESEARCH LIBRARIANS FOR HELP IS JUST A VEILED WAY TO SAY “GO BOTHER THEM”.

I’m halfway to my wit’s end with it. Why my university doesn’t have a required research lit class, particularly since they’re trying to be an up-and-coming research university, is beyond me.

PS: @commasameleon It’s not taught in American Universities or Colleges because there’s a general assumption that they learned how to do all of this in high school.

Over The Waves by Setsuko Matsushima

Pride 2025

These Colors Don't Run!

You're right. School is bullshit, homework is bullshit, waking up early is bullshit, going to bed early is bullshit. Some adults are just pointlessly cruel, even those in positions of authority over you. Sometimes adults are wrong, and, in fact, sometimes you are right

You were born with an innate sense of justice and fairness and adults have spent your entire life trying to beat it out of you so you'll shut up and do what you're told in an unjust and unfair society. Don't let them. Many of us have to take effort to relearn the wisdom you have right now, the ability to tell when something is bullshit even if you can't articulate why yet

You deserve happiness, fulfillment, and liberation just as much as any adult. Those first 18 years are just as important as any other time in your life, and it's time you'll never get back. Don't let anyone take them from you just because you're too young to fight back

Question everything, and never take "that's just the way it is" as an answer. Sometimes when things don't make sense to you it's because they just don't make any goddamn sense

Pick your battles, and be strategic. Don't take this post as permission to go starting fights for no reason. But remember that you have worth, and our society tends to not respect that. And you're right: that is bullshit

My youngest son (16) struggles because he is not really suited to school as it exists. He’s literally brilliant but also inflexible and doesn’t work well when he has no control over his own day. He and I have just been trying to get through this for 11 years now. Next year he’s in a vocational program for game design, hopefully, which will cut back on a lot of the things he truly can’t stand: 

- why is getting changed in front of everybody for gym class a thing? 

- why do I have to sit through the same material in health class multiple times? (he is ace and sex-repulsed)

- why is this teacher angry with me? I don’t understand Google classroom. 

- why does everyone keep asking me about my college plans? do they think I’m going through this one minute longer than I have to? fuck all the way off! 

Fantastic

You'll need:

A microwave safe mug, milk of any kind, honey, vanilla extract, and either a little whisk or a fork

First, pour just enough honey to cover the very bottom of your mug (like, at most a tablespoon). Add a splash (quarter teaspoon or less) of vanilla extract and as much cinnamon as your heart wants.

Then pour in juuuust a little bit of milk. Like a third of the cup. Whisk as best you can but it'll be sticky, so we're gonna microwave it for 30 seconds to get everything to stir up.

This will keep the cinnamon from floating around on top at the end, which isn't as fun to drink.

Now add the rest of your milk, and microwave for one minute. Test your temp and go from there in 15 second bursts, although I usually do mine for two minutes total here. Stir between bursts.

And ta-da! It's very comforting. I find it helps me sleep and also it smells real nice.

Honestly ... I'm excited about nearly every critter I encounter outdoors. My friends have watched me stop in my tracks to observe honeybees on clover, or sparrows eating out of trash cans, or velvet mites crossing the sidewalk. I once did a presentation for a nature interpreter class about The Ecology of the Vacant Lot, which my coworkers called "all my favorite critters in the Wal-Mart Parking Lot." I grew up in DC, and urban wildlife, no matter how small, has always enchanted me as much as charismatic megafauna.

But ... the first time I saw a cave cricket in the wild, my reaction really surprised me. I've never lived somewhere that didn't have a cave cricket infestation. They're a nuisance in dark basements and apartment kitchens. But when I turn over a log and see one in the woods, or shine my flashlight on one deep in a cave? It's a beautiful creature, transformed from home intruder to native wildlife.

A cave cricket is like if a radioactive peanut M&M had crossbows for legs and its primary defense mechanism was launching itself directly at your face. It is an indestructible cannibal that can live forever in your basement by eating the occasional dust particle or its own legs. It has never known fear.

The house I lived in prior to this one had a basement closet that my housemates and I called The Spricket Dungeon due to it being filled with hundreds of cave crickets when we moved in. A real living wallpaper situation. It took us years to even make a noticable dent in the population. It seemed the closet was a sort of closed ecosystem exempt from the second law of thermodynamics. You could hear the popcorn sound of them hopping around from outside the door.