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Wes Jackson

Wes Jackson Quotes

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Famous Wes Jackson Quotes

“You may think of myths as worlds of light sabers, rings of power, and enchanted spells. Hip-Hop is also a mythical place. A place free from strangling bonds of racism, sexism and bigotry. A place where the only currency is your skills with a mic, a turntable, or a drum machine. Hip-Hop is filled with faraway lands populated by dragons, wizards and knights - places like Marcy Projects, 5th Ward, Compton, Shaolin and Strong Island. Our knights are MC's, B-Boys, B-Girls, DJs, producers and graf artists.”

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Book:Ten Years Fresh: The Story Of The Brooklyn Hip-Hop Festival
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“The farmer and the farm, like "the environment," are looked upon, for example, as means to offset trade deficits. The farm is a place where we can externalize costs. The cost of pesticides to the farmer and the cost of the pesticides to the soil and groundwater are regarded similarly by the public: "a serious problem that something ought to be done about." But the problem is more fundamental than this glib statement would indicate, for soil pollution is an expense of production. So are pesticides and nitrates in our farm wells. So is the loss of farmers from the land.”

WellsMeanDoneProblemLossEnvironmentLandExampleSeriousOughtCostFundamentalsTradeProductionsStatementsSoilExpensesFarmsFarmersPollutionDeficitPesticidesGroundwater
Author:Wes Jackson
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“We recognize that our progress as a species does not have to be defined in terms of wealth or material and physical growth any more than our progress as individuals has to be defined in terms of physical growth. Physical growth of the body reaches a limit, but the character and the soul of the individual continues to grow, or at least has a chance to continue, often to our last breath. It is simple minded to define our well being in material terms, when that well-being has an aesthetic dimension, and intellectual dimension, a moral dimension.”

WellsDoeSoulCharacterBodyLastsIndividualGrowsGrowthTermWealthChanceSimpleMoralProgressMaterialsLimitsIntellectualBreathsSpeciesEnvironmentalDefinedWell BeingDimensionsAestheticSustainability
Author:Wes Jackson
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“When we conduct agriculture, we are, therefore, altering the ecological arrangement that was responsible for our genesis as a species. I think that this is the reason that this alienation has allowed us to see and regard land mostly as a resource. So we have created a problem for ourselves from the word "go," for land is not a resource any more than humans are resources.”

ThinkingHumansReasonProblemLandResourcesResponsibleRegardSpeciesEnvironmentalSustainabilityAgricultureArrangementsAlienationGenesisEcological
Author:Wes Jackson
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“It is doubtful that the dissection of living animals and plants could be done by those who believe them to be holy. A pantheist would not view trees as so many board feet in the manner a Christian would. A pantheist would be less likely to measure the number of acre feet coming over a waterfall than his Christian descendent, centuries later who had become a scientist. That which is sacred would be handled with a certain reverence.”

BelieveDoneWould BeChristianCertainAnimalViewsNumbersTreeFeetCenturyHolyScientistSacredPlantEnvironmentalBoardsReverenceStewardshipDoubtfulAcresWaterfallsDissection
Author:Wes Jackson
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“When people, land, and community are as one, all three members prosper; when they relate not as members but as competing interests, all three are exploited. By consulting Nature as the source and measure of that membership, The Land Institute seeks to develop an agriculture that will save soil from being lost or poisoned while promoting a community life at once prosperous and enduring.”

PeopleThreeLostInterestNatureCommunityLandSourceMembersCompetitionEndureProsperityRelateSoilAgricultureCompetingPromotingProsperousInstituteMembershipConsulting
Author:Wes Jackson
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“A necessary part of our intelligence is on the line as the oral tradition becomes less and less important. There was a time throughout our land when it was common for stories to be told and retold, a most valuable exercise, for the story retold is the story reexamined over and over again at different levels of intellectual and emotional growth.”

ImportantDifferentStoriesGrowthLinesLevelsCommonLandEmotionalExerciseIntellectualTraditionValuableDifferent LevelsEmotional GrowthOral Tradition
Book:Becoming Native to This Place
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“The dialectical or ecological approach asserts that creating the world is involved in our every act. It is impossible for us to operate in our daily lives and not create the world that everyone must live in. What we desire arranges the genetic code in all of our major crops and livestock. We cannot avoid participating in the creation, and it is in agriculture, far and away our largest and most basic artifact, that human culture and the creation totally interpenetrate.”

WorldHumansDesireCultureImpossibleCreationInvolvedApproachCreatingMajorsCodeDaily LifeAgricultureCropsEcologicalParticipatingArtifactsLivestock
Book:Becoming Native to This Place
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“Our task is to build cultural fortresses to protect our emerging nativeness. They must be strong enough to hold at bay the powers of consumerism, the powers of greed and envy and pride. One of the most effective ways for this to come about would be for our universities to assume the awesome responsibility to both validate and educate those who want to be homecomers -- not necessarily to go home but to go someplace and dig in and begin the long search and experiment to become native.”

WayWantLongEnoughHomeWould BeStrongResponsibilityPrideProtectTasksAssumingGreedUniversityEnvyExperimentsNativeEducateConsumerismStrong EnoughEmergingFortresses
Book:Becoming Native to This Place
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