Radical Stories in the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden

Abstract

When the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden was established in Cape Town, South Africa, in 1913, it was envisioned as a site that served white citizens. Kirstenbosch was presented as a landscape in which plants functioned as representatives of their wild habitats. The botanical garden’s curatorial practices silenced histories of colonial occupation, frontier violence, colonial agriculture, and slavery that had shaped the land on which it was built. Narratives that celebrated colonial histories were cultivated in monumental gardening. Throughout its existence, Kirstenbosch has centered Western epistemologies. Where Indigenous knowledge systems were featured, they were mediated through ethnobotany. While human stakeholders lacked commitment to transformation, emergent ecologies evolved that interrupted colonial narratives and Western epistemologies. Discussing histories of wild almond trees, hybrid plants, and cycads, the author suggests that the emergent ecologies around them introduced radical stories to Kirstenbosch. The emergent ecologies’ storytelling is radical because it works at the roots of plants and historical genealogies, and it roots different narratives—of ruination and new flourishing, diversity and local becomings, multispecies kinship and love—into Kirstenbosch. In doing so, the emergent ecologies introduce possibilities for reimagining the botanical garden as an institution of environmental governance from within its confines and its disciplines.

Botanic Gardens in Biodiversity Conservation and Sustainability: History, Contemporary Engagements, Decolonization Challenges, and Renewed Potential

“…At the height of modern European colonialism in the late 18th and 19th centuries, the reach of botanic gardens in European metropolises extended into colonial holdings where satellite botanic gardens facilitated processes of plant extraction and acclimatization. Not rarely, satellite gardens, such as, for example, Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden in South Africa, experienced colonialism at the hands of a succession of colonial powers [33] as the result of the ebbs and flows of shifting imperial geopolitics.…”

“…This, for instance, had an impact on the African continent during the 1990s and early 2000s when a form of neoliberal biodiversity conservation sought to implement Eurocentric visions of nature preservation that were often at odds with local knowledge practices and priorities [74,75]. The literature on botanic gardens confirms that indeed colonial dynamics can be reproduced in the context of contemporary biodiversity conservation, as exemplified in South Africa [33,76], British Columbia, Canada [65], and Palestine [77,78].…”

“…As botanic gardens re-invent themselves as institutions of global sustainability, grounded in principles of social equity [31] and environmental justice, they are often confronted with the legacies of former colonial arrangements [32,33]. This matter has become increasingly important in recent years, where botanic gardens formerly associated with colonial endeavours are now embracing highly productive conversations on what decolonizing their institutions may entail.…”

Botanic Gardens in Biodiversity Conservation and Sustainability: History, Contemporary Engagements, Challenges and Renewed Potential

“…As botanic gardens re-invent themselves as institutions of global sustainability, grounded in principles of social equity [9] and environmental justice, they are often confronted with the legacies of former colonial arrangements [10,11]. This matter has become increasingly important in recent years, with leading botanic gardens now embracing highly productive conversations on what decolonizing their institutions may entail.…”