How did ordinary home gardeners in nineteenth-century America perceive their gardens as tied to the fates of the nation and the world? This Garden Conservancy online talk on June 13 shows how caring for plants brought nineteenth-century home gardeners face-to-face with the greatest political issues of the day: colonialism, conquest, slavery, and democracy. It focuses on a selection of gardeners who were also famous writers—including Emily Dickinson, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Frederick Douglass—and shows how their homes and gardens were important places for broader environmental thinking. This talk draws on research from Mary Kuhn’s new book, The Garden Politic: Global Plants and Botanical Nationalism in Nineteenth-Century America. Mary Kuhn is an assistant professor of English at the University of Virginia. She is the author of The Garden Politic and many articles on the relationship between people, plants, and politics. At UVA, she routinely teaches courses in nineteenth-century literary studies, environmental literature, and the environmental humanities.
$5 for Garden Conservancy members, $15 for nonmembers. A recording of this webinar will be sent to all registrants a few days after the event. We encourage you to register, even if you cannot attend the live webinar. Register at https://www.gardenconservancy.org/education/education-events/virtual-talk-the-garden-politic-in-nineteenth-century-america
