U of Kentucky, 2023
“Robin Wall Kimmerer is a delightful person, both on stage and off. Both her keynote and her more informal conversation event were energizing, refreshing, and compelling to so many participants—we continue to receive glowing feedback about how transformative Robin’s visit was and continues to be. Robin was also incredibly patient and gracious with us—she probably signed 150 books during her visit. Thank you, Robin!”
Guilford College, 2023
“Dr. Kimmerer’s talk was highly engaging and informative, and the audience loved her. Her sensitivity and caring were clearly communicated in her ability to connect to students, faculty, staff, and the community. Her message of our relationships with nature and its importance inspired the audience to reflect on their roles in the environment, finding their gifts, and seeking beauty and science in the natural world. She is a wonderful speaker!”
Washington State U, 2023
“Robin Wall Kimmerer was as gracious, generous, and warm in person as her narrative voice in Braiding Sweetgrass! Her warmth and welcome, combined with her insightful presentation, invite her audience to welcome and thoughtfully consider new ways of thinking about themselves and their connections to their more-than-human companions. In my nearly twenty years of hosting authors on campus, Kimmerer’s talk elicited an outpouring of responses that are unique in the level of gratitude expressed by attendees.”
“Robin’s talk was thought-provoking and moving. Her answers to audience questions were generous without being wordy, which is unusual. She handled a politically delicate question deftly. In addition, because Robin straddles so many areas of thought, her visit enabled us to braid together various strands of our own community. Professors from three areas—biology, environmental humanities, and Native American history—worked together on this event, from proposal to execution. Their students all benefited. In addition, we used Robin’s visit to strengthen ties with the Catawba Nation, a local tribe. Robin’s visit, in other words, helped us to strengthen our community, on and beyond campus.” – Davidson College, 2023
“Robin Wall Kimmerer was not only the most thoughtful, most forceful, and most impassioned speaker we have had to-date, she was the most stirring. As one of the attendees told me afterward, Robin’s talk was not merely enriching, it was a genuinely transformational experience. Several people told me that they were planning to wild their lawns and till new gardens to reconnect with the land and rebuild their communities after heeding Robin’s message. Robin truly made the setting feel intimate and her subject feel vital. Perhaps greatest of all, she renewed our hope and love for the natural world.” – U of Texas Austin
“Dr. Kimmerer’s visit exceeded all of the (high!) expectations I had. She was incredibly warm and kind to all and was particularly attentive and generous toward our students. Indeed, after having lunch with the Native American Student Union, she spent the afternoon rewriting parts of her lecture to better address the topics they had expressed the most interest in. This was truly above and beyond and is illustrative of her deep commitment to young people and to teaching. The Colorado College Environmental Studies Program brings prestigious speakers to campus regularly, but Dr. Kimmerer’s visit was by far the most successful and impactful of any that I have been a part of.” Professor Corina McKendry, Director, Colorado College Environmental Studies Program.
“In a world where so many environmental speakers leave the younger generation feeling doom and gloom, Robin gives her audience hope and tangible ways of acting that allow students to feel they can make change. She marries two worlds that are relatable for young people while inspiring them they can do the same. She also draws her audience back to the norms of human society in North America for the majority of human existence on this continent, reminding us there was for a very long time a sustainable way of living here.” Taft School, 2022
“Robin is a charismatic speaker who engages her audience through captivating stories passed down through generations, by sharing her expansive knowledge of plants and animals, providing actionable insights and guidance, and through her infectious love and appreciation for our natural world. It felt like medicine just to be in her presence. I don’t know if this is going to come out with language to match how I felt in her presence. What a gift Robin is to the world. I see the responsibility she holds, and shall I say burden it must be to present at an event at Kripalu. To be on stolen Mohican lands while speaking to a largely white bodied audience- the weight of this is not lost on me. The emotional lift that she must hold is not lost on me. I am so grateful that she is willing to offer so freely her story telling gift, love of land and plants, her social justice fire (god, I love a fiery woman!), poetry and kindness. She was far kinder and generous of her time than required. She sat next to grieving woman as I would imagine she holds her own grieving heart. She stayed for book signing so that everyone had a chance to have a moment with her. She really is a beautiful expression of heart, spirit and mind-perhaps she is the medicine wheel. My heart is full, and my mind changed.” – Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health, 2022
“Dr. Kimmerer was so gracious and curious about us, and the questions she asked led to an experience specific to us – words that we needed to hear to encourage and inspire us to the next steps in our pursuit of a better relationship with the land and with our other than human relatives.” – Gettysburg College
“The response to Robin Wall Kimmerer’s event at Howard County Library has been nothing less than thunderous with appreciation. The empathy and knowledge of her presentation came across like poetry. We are so appreciative of her visit with our community, and how her shared wisdom has strengthened us individually and collectively.” – Howard County Reads, 2022
“Robin harmoniously brings together Indigenous knowledge and teachings to illustrate the importance of caring for the earth, one another and everything more than human. With a kind and humble style, her talk and engagement with the audience offered valuable thoughts for reflection. We are grateful for the opportunity to gather as a learning community to listen to Robin’s wisdom and stories. ” – Langara College, 2022
“Robin Wall Kimmerer is a mesmerizing speaker and a brilliant thinker. Our venue was packed with more than two thousand people, and yet, with Robin onstage, the event felt warm and intimate, like a gathering of close friends. Her book, BRAIDING SWEETGRASS, explores Indigenous wisdom alongside botany and beautiful writing about caregiving and creativity. She’s a generous speaker whose energizing ideas and reflections inspire readers and listeners to make changes in their lives—to share their unique gifts with the Earth.” — Milkweed Editions, 2022
“Our annual fundraiser event to support San Francisco Botanical Garden’s youth education programs and extraordinary plant collections with Robin Wall Kimmerer as special guest speaker went seamlessly and we achieved our $400,000 fundraising goal. Robin received a standing ovation from the crowd and moved several attendees to tears with her powerful, inspiring speech. Working with Robin and her team felt like a true partnership and we can’t recommend them highly enough.” — San Francisco Botanical Garden
“Robin Wall Kimmerer was a pleasure to work with as a keynote speaker. Robin’s words were truly inspiring and engaging and we received much positive feedback from people wanting to be more mindful of indigenous perspectives and history when conserving lands. In the feedback, we heard the words: Humbling. Challenging. Provocative. Compelling. Emotional. Inspired. Robin’s talk got a number of people expanding their thinking as they work to build their awareness of restoration and reciprocity into their conservation work. Robin helped to inspire the NH conservation community to be more in tune with the long history, since time immemorial, of indigenous people caring for our lands. Thank you, Robin, for sharing your heritage and knowledge with us, so that we may work to make a positive change for a better future.” — New Hampshire Land Conservation Conference, 2022
“Connecting people with the wonder, beauty and value of trees and plants for healthier communities is our mission at Holden Forests & Gardens. Robin’s reverence and her philosophy of nature are guiding lights for the public garden world as we work to heal our communities through greater appreciation of plants and trees. Her lecture was our best attended to date and we’ll be referring back to it in the years to come.” — Kent State University, 2022
“Gonzaga University hosted Robin Wall Kimmerer for a virtual event centered around her book, BRAIDING SWEETGRASS. She was able to speak to a diverse audience in a way that was welcoming and engaging, while also inviting us all to see the world in new ways. Her interaction with our panelists, which included students and faculty, was particularly conversational and inviting. Her presence coupled with her passion and expertise made for an incredibly impactful evening for our Gonzaga community!” — Gonzaga University, 2022
“Working with Robin and her team at Authors Unbound has been a streamlined, clear process. This four-day campus residency with Dr. Kimmerer has been a tremendous asset to our learning, teaching, and research communities on campus. We plan to continue to address the questions and ideas she has left us with as we continue future UO Common Reading programming.” — U of Oregon, 2022
“Dr. Kimmerer guided our institution at a difficult time of transformation, where we are struggling with how to integrate traditional ecological knowledge at all levels of our operations, from facilities to recruitment to pedagogy. Her wisdom is holistic, healing, and a guiding compass for where we want to go. She couldn’t have come to us at a more ripe time for change, and gave us needed direction for navigating the murky and seemingly paradoxical waters of institutionalizing justice. Her expertise in multiple ways of knowing, higher education, and environmental health is exemplary of what we’re trying to achieve as we refashion our university as a polytechnic on indigenous land.”— Humboldt State University, 2021
“As the keynote to our annual environmental and sustainability education conference, Dr. Kimmerer, added and highlighted heart and thoughtful reflection to the energy of our whole conference.” — E3 Washington Conference, 2021
“Robin is a delightful guest. She is generous with readers, always responding to their questions in detail and engaging in a manner that feels like a conversation (not just a Q&A). Our readers were extremely engaged by the book and thrilled to hear Robin speak in person. Our event was a great success.”— Rochester Reads, 2021
“We are grateful to have had the chance to host Dr. Kimmerer on our campus. The presentation — though virtual — still managed to feel vital, even intimate. Dr. Kimmerer radiated calm and warmth. Many of our favorite moments from the book were revisited and expanded upon.”— Truman University, 2021
“Our author visit with Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer was went so smoothly. She was in conversation with a moderator and flowed seamlessly from conversation to answering attendee questions. The community was so engaged in the themes Robin covered as well as just taking a moment to hear an author speak on something they know so much about. That’s the key – Robin is so knowledgeable and thoughtful, which are really the two attributes that made this a success.”— Arlington Heights, One Book One Village – 2021
“In a world in which predominant messaging often centers on owning things to make life rewarding, Robin turns that vision on its head. She reminds listeners of the wisdom of indigenous perspectives that ask what we can give back to the Earth. Our students were challenged to look at their relationship with nature and each other in a new way as she skillfully wove in graphics and elder wisdom. She challenged the audience while leaving them with a message of hope that they can be part of the change we need to address climate change, habitat loss, and other critical ecological challenges.”— Lawrenceville School, 2021
“Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer is an outstanding connector. Her virtual talk with the National Writers Series brought together 700 people from across northern Michigan: environmental activists, gardening enthusiasts, book lovers, and more. She speaks the way she writes, with poetry and intention that inspires an audience and gives them the tools to move forward as better stewards of our world.”— National Writers Series, 2021
“Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer presented (virtually) the 24th annual Wege Lecture in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on May 27, 2021. Nearly 2,900 individuals preregistered for the event, which included a panel discussion with local Native American and diversity leaders. Dr. Kimmerer gave a compelling prepared presentation on reciprocity and restoring human relationships with the land. She devoted significant time and effort in advance of the lecture to familiarize herself with the local context, including reviewing written materials and participating in an advance webinar briefing for her by local leaders. She did a marvelous job in seamlessly integrating the local context into her prepared remarks and in participating knowledgeably in the ensuing panel discussion and Q&A session. Dr. Kimmerer and her agent, Christie Hinrichs, were responsive and helpful during the entire planning process; they were a delight to work with.”— Wege Foundation, 2021
“We are so grateful for the opportunity to have gotten to connect Robin Wall Kimmerer with an intimate group of students at Big Picture High School day for a soul-enriching conversation on writing, attention and care, and nurture for the Earth! it was honestly such a balm, (I wish everyone could have witnessed!) Robin was just as generous with her questioning of students and their projects, and they were incredibly wise and thoughtful with their questions to her!”— Seattle Arts & Lectures
“Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer’s presentation was all I had hoped for and more. I’ve heard her speak in podcasts and have read her books, but having her live was magical. Her presence is calming and provides hope on issues that can be scary and overwhelming. The first look at our survey responses from attendees has been overwhelmingly outstanding with all comments being positive and many attendees wishing we could have spent many more hours absorbing her knowledge. Dr. Kimmerer mentions that being an educated person means know the gifts that you have to share and I feel so lucky that she shared her many gifts with us.”— Alachua Library, 2021
“Dr. Kimmerer’s visit was among the highlights of our year! She is an inspiring speaker and a generous teacher. Her message about ecological reciprocity is not only urgent and timely but also hopeful. What’s more, her work is meaningful and relevant to a wide variety of scholarly disciplines—the sciences as well as the humanities. We are so grateful to Dr. Kimmerer for visiting our community and sharing with us some glimpses of her remarkable career.”— U of St. Thomas, 2021
“It was such an honor to bring Robin and our other speakers together. They were so generous with their time and stories – it was a different type of talk/event than we typically have with our restoration community, but very appreciated. And very necessary. At the beginning of the event, attendees typed in where they were located, and at the end people typed in what they were going to do with this gift of stories they received. In the days since the event I have heard from so many colleagues who were impacted deeply and who are applying some of the stories to their lives and work. Robin spoke to the importance of reciprocity to the land and wove in our group’s focus on river restoration throughout. I am so grateful for her time, and yours.”— River Restoration
“Robin was a passionate, engaging speaker in spite of the event being held virtually. Her message of inclusion and diversity touched the audience and motivated us all to be better teachers, students, and members of the earth community.”— Brigham Young University
“Dr. Kimmerer was the perfect speaker to kick off our spring semester at Normandale Community College. She thoughtfully addressed the questions of cultural inclusivity in the academy that our campus is working on, and her keynote address inspired genuine questions and meaningful changes to our courses and campus policies. We hope we can invite her back in the future to share her insights with even more of our campus community.”— Normandale Community College
“ would absolutely recommend Robin Wall Kimmerer as a speaker. She was so generous with her time. During our tech check, she listened to all of our questions (and some gushing about her work; she also asked us more about our work at the museum so that she could better tailor her remarks to our audience. Her talk, therefore, was incredibly insightful, rooted not only in her area of expertise, but also making specific connections to the museum. Our audience expressed so much gratitude for the opportunity to hear her words, and our staff are thinking about art through an entirely new lens. I couldn’t have asked for more!”— Minneapolis Museum of Art
“Dr. Kimmerer was a joy to work with. She fully embraced the format of our program, and welcomed with such humility and enthusiasm the opportunity to share the stage with our other guest: exhibiting artist Olivia Whetung. Robin immediately understood the connections between each body of work, and provided meaningful responses that brought to light the common themes. It was a compelling dialogue that left guests satisfied and thinking about big ideas.”— Campbell River Art Gallery
“Robin’s generous spirit and rich scholarship invited the audience to fundamentally reimagine their relationship to the natural world. Instead of viewing themselves as positioned above, audience members were invited to see the way they are embedded within and a part of nature. This reorientation is what is required for humans to reimagine a world in which natural elements (particularly plants) are not only teachers but also relatives. If humanity is to mitigate unprecedented rates of climate change these are precisely the teachings that must be shared.”— Queen’s University
“ We could not have chosen a better keynote speaker for the Feinberg series. Robin’s lecture set the perfect tone for the series overall and provided a sorely-needed antidote to narratives of hopelessness and apocalypse, as well as to the dangerous notion that we can “technofix” our way out of environmental crisis. We’ve received feedback from viewers around the world who were moved and changed in their relationship to our earth through Robin’s teachings.”— UMass Amherst Feinberg Series
“Dr. Kimmerer was wonderful to work with and crafted her talk to our audience and goals. We have received so much positive feedback from attendees and hope we are able to host her again.”— Michigan State University
“Nocturne was pleased to feature Robin Wall Kimmerer as our keynote event in our festival. It was a unique opportunity to bring together the author, our curator Lindsay Dobbin, and artist Shalan Joudry. Robin was generous with her time and her knowledge and our attendees were entranced for the full event. Thank you to Authors Unbound for helping to facilitate this unique and important conversation.”— Nocturne Festival – Canada
“Robin was such a joy to work with from start to finish. She is a great listener and listened to our goals as a company as well as listening to our community and fully taking the time to answer each of their questions thoughtfully throughout the entirety of the webinar. We hope to host Robin again in the future – maybe in person!”— Christy Dawn Dresses – CA