People–plant interactions and the ecological self

Abstract

Plants, People, Planet. 2020;2:201-211. | 201 wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/ppp3 1 | INTRODUC TI ON Being human means being in constant contact and communication with plants. Human societies need plants, even in an era of highspeed technological transformations. We wear plants, sit on plants, use plants to get to work, write on the pulverized remains of plants, and ingest plants. Plants are a backdrop to ceremonious events. We exchange plants to communicate condolences, congratulations, or care. Plants generate oxygen needed for human survival, and medicines for healing. Yet in many situations these intimate interactions with plants have become entirely normalized and taken for granted. Itis easy to go through the day unaware of the contributions that plants This article calls attention to a promising area of research and practice with great societal impact: the potential of people-plant interactions to transform individuals and communities. Overall, the article connects insights from the practice of therapeutic horticulture to broader perspectives from social theory. A better understanding of these connections can increase opportunities for meaningful human engagements with plants and encourage implementation of interventions that might contribute to the flourishing of personal, community, and ecological life. SummaryThis article investigates some of the important contributions that plant environments can make to the transformation of the self, and to social life more generally. While therapeutic horticulture practices demonstrate the positive impacts that plants have on human health, social theories of the self do not typically account for what can be learned from these practices. Accordingly, this article reviews theories of the self with an eye toward understanding how people-plant interactions invite new approaches to the self. This perspective demonstrates that, much like living plant ecologies, the self can be conceived as highly relational and interdependent. A spectrum of peopleplant interactions is introduced to clarify the variety of possible situations that might contribute to the emergence of a more ecological self. Conclusions about how the experience of people-plant interactions contributes to the transformation of the self are offered, with relevance for future scholarly research and horticultural practice. K E Y W O R D Sgreen care and horticultural therapy, plants and society, pragmatism and symbolic interaction, social and environmental psychology, theories of the self

"You are what you eat": Plant-Human Relations in Home Gardens

“…Given that human life is impossible without botanical worlds, it is surprising that leafy beings are often portrayed as holding background roles or having loose and distant connections with humans (Seshia Galvin, 2018; Pitt, 2016;Gibson, 2018). A plethora of studies contrast this "plant blindness" with the intimate human-plant companionships that can grow in green spaces (Seshia Galvin 2018;Alcaraz, 2019;Gibson, 2018;DelSesto, 2020;Pitt, 2016;Elton, 2021). DelSesto (2020) describes plant blindness as an adaptive brain strategy that filters out elements in individuals' lives that appear unimportant to their daily rhythms.…”

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