When stringent social distancing measures went into place to help slow the spread of COVID-19 in mid-March, the calls began. These weren’t calls to doctors from people concerned about symptoms, or to unemployment officers from people without work — though those calls started, too. Instead, they were calls to domestic violence hotlines, from abuse survivorsContinue reading “Staying Safe When Socially Distancing With an Abuser”
Author Archives: reinagattuso
The Chef Bringing Native American Flavors to Communities in Quarantine
WHAT’S IN YOUR KITCHEN PANTRY? If you answered quinoa, green beans, or potatoes, you have, perhaps unbeknownst to you, been eating Native American heritage. “They might not know they have indigenous foods in their cupboard: might be canned corn, canned beans, squash,” says Brian Yazzie, a Twin Cities-based chef and food activist from the Navajo Nation,Continue reading “The Chef Bringing Native American Flavors to Communities in Quarantine”
Preventing Household Conflict When You’re Stuck at Home Together
Most of us are so busy with jobs, school, and caretaking responsibilities that extended time at home with our loved ones once seemed like an unattainable dream. Self-isolation, resulting from the coronavirus crisis and government orders to shelter in place, however, can bring with it the silver lining of getting to reconnect with those weContinue reading “Preventing Household Conflict When You’re Stuck at Home Together”
The COVID-19 Pandemic and The Dire Need for a Mental Health Safety Net
As governments across the United States are requesting, or mandating, their residents to “shelter in place” to help prevent the further spread of the novel coronavirus, acute anxiety grows exponentially one group in particular: our neighbors without housing. Many U.S. residents have already lost their jobs, or risk future job loss, due to closures inContinue reading “The COVID-19 Pandemic and The Dire Need for a Mental Health Safety Net”
5 Tips For Maintaining Community During the Coronavirus Crisis
Having a strong community is one of the most important factors in our mental and emotional health. Loneliness or social isolation increases our risk of depression and anxiety, and it can even make us more vulnerable to physical ailments, increasing our risk of heart disease by 29%, and stroke by 32%. Usually, maintaining strong community bonds is asContinue reading “5 Tips For Maintaining Community During the Coronavirus Crisis”
The Sake Master Reviving a Long-Forgotten Local Rice
EVERY YEAR FOR DECADES, SCIENTISTS at the Hiroshima Prefectural Agriculture Gene Bank have planted a small patch of hattanso rice. Its stalks are spring-green and spindly, its grains stubby, with a white core of endosperm visible in light. Hiroshima’s rice fields are fecund with Hattanso’s descendants, which farmers sell to sake brewers in dozens of prefectures across Japan.Continue reading “The Sake Master Reviving a Long-Forgotten Local Rice”
On the Hunt for the Wild Relatives of America’s Favorite Produce
WHEN COLIN KHOURY WAS SIX years old, he committed an act of civil disobedience. It was Southern California in the 1980s, and real estate companies were hungry to turn the remaining farms and wilderness bordering Los Angeles into shiny new developments. Barely out of kindergarten, Khoury was firmly against the developers. His love for landscape wasContinue reading “On the Hunt for the Wild Relatives of America’s Favorite Produce”
How Ancient Tooth Plaque Solved the Mystery of the Banana’s Trans-Pacific Journey
A TYPICAL DAY FOR MONICA Tromp might include scraping tartar off 3,000-year-old human incisors. “It’s basically like being a dental hygienist for the dead,” says Tromp, an Affiliated Researcher at New Zealand’s University of Otago, about her work studying ancient Pacific Islanders’ diets. The hot, humid climate of places like Vanuatu, an archipelago 1,100 miles eastContinue reading “How Ancient Tooth Plaque Solved the Mystery of the Banana’s Trans-Pacific Journey”
Australian Wildfires Uncovered Hidden Sections of a Huge, Ancient Aquaculture System
IN VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA, AN ANCIENT labyrinth of waterways snakes across a once-volcanic landscape. This is the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape, a vast aquacultural system the Gunditjmara Aboriginal people, who still call this country home, began constructing 6,600 years ago. Parts of the system are still in use today. Ask locals about Budj Bim, and you’ll invariablyContinue reading “Australian Wildfires Uncovered Hidden Sections of a Huge, Ancient Aquaculture System”
How to Spend Valentine’s Day If You’re Single
Whenever I read a self-help article that advises women to “put yourself first,” or “cultivate self-love,” I want to throw my laptop out my fourth floor apartment window in despair. (I don’t actually do it, of course, because laptops are expensive.) Often, these seemingly empowering pieces of advice come with subtle directives about what weContinue reading “How to Spend Valentine’s Day If You’re Single”
