Soil: The Story of a Black Mother's Garden

In Soil: The Story of a Black Mother’s Garden, poet and scholar Camille T. Dungy weaves together nature writing, memoir, and environmental justice in a powerful meditation on belonging, resistance, and care for the land.

Dungy recounts a seven-year journey to diversify her garden in Fort Collins, Colorado, a predominantly white community with strict—and limiting—rules about what could be planted. In response, she transforms her garden into a living act of resistance, cultivating plants that reflect her heritage while challenging the cultural and ecological harm of enforced homogeneity.

Using the plants, herbs, vegetables, and flowers she grows as both metaphor and grounding reality, Dungy explores how diversity—ecological, cultural, and linguistic—is essential to the health of our planet and our communities. The garden becomes a site of inquiry and affirmation, revealing how environmental conversations are inseparable from questions of race, history, and power.

Brilliant, lyrical, and deeply thoughtful, Soil expands the boundaries of nature writing and invites readers to recognize the enduring relationship between people of the African diaspora and the land—wherever soil rests beneath their feet.

Perfect for: readers of literary nonfiction, environmental justice advocates, gardeners interested in the cultural dimensions of land stewardship, educators, and anyone seeking a more inclusive vision of environmental care.