Variability is often overlooked in our discussions of climate change. A warming climate means not only increased temperatures, but also increased variability, including more extreme cold, drought, and rainfall. Climate change is connected to the carbon cycle, the invisible shifting of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to different forms in plants and soil - most of which we can’t detect without careful, repeated observation. We have to understand this variability to create communities that are resilient to a changing climate. 

Embodied knowledge is often devalued in discussions of science. Many institutions are not designed to include the movement of our bodies and our direct experiences of the environment as a valuable source of information. Embodied knowledge can look many different ways; for example, Eva (the scientist in this team) can have a pretty good idea of the soil quality just by how it feels to dig. Her body has learned about the characteristics of the soil from the action of collecting samples and reinforced by the lab tests that she then conducts. Building climate resilience requires both scientific research and the embodied knowledge of people most impacted by climate change. 

still // moving asks, “How can embodied knowledge make the invisible processes that drive variation in environments salient?” We created a “score” (a tool dancers use to generate movement) that guides people around a tree surrounded by screens made from fabric dyed with food scraps, weaving in Eva’s research on how to make waste productive and build soil health. The score invites us to learn about the carbon cycle with our own embodied experience. We believe that this practice can be a way to experiment with putting embodied knowledge at the forefront while teaching us how we perceive the variation in the environment - two parts of helping us build more resilient communities.