This year, Botanical Culture welcomed our first intern!
Tell us about yourself!
Hi, my name is Béla Tanner, and I use all neopronouns. As well as being an intern at Botanical Culture, I’m a freshie at UC Santa Cruz in California. I’m a declared major in Marine Biology and hope to add on the Critical Race and Ethnic Studies (CRES) and Art majors as well. If a triple-major doesn’t work out, I’ll do Art as a minor.
What are some of your duties as an intern?
I’ll be a handyperson helping us prepare to launch this new website. I’ll do lots of research and writing, and I’m excited to contribute to the free, public herbal library that we’re launching this year. I’ll also help kickstart our social media and create infographics about herbs for different platforms. I’ll help create our first newsletter announcing all these goodies very soon.
What are you most interested in learning about and contributing?
Herbal knowledge has been both stigmatized and hidden throughout recent history, and part of our mission at Botanical Culture is to make it accessible to all, especially to those impacted by various marginalizations. I also hope to research and help develop resources for gender-affirming transition support for fellow transgender, non-binary, and intersex people.
I’m excited to expand Botanical Culture’s resources to include herbal information for everyone, particularly those who often receive inadequate care and health education.
What’s your favorite plant?
That’s a tough choice! I love redwood, mangrove, and oak trees because they’re all gorgeous and play vital roles in their respective ecosystems. I also love lavender, dill, rosemary, mint, thai and habanero peppers because they taste wonderful in almost everything.
This is technically cheating because kelp isn’t a plant, but I also love kelp. It’s fascinating how tiny algae band together in systems that can grow as tall as ancient trees without true roots or leaves! As humans, we have so much to re-learn from nature, and I hope we learn more from kelp! 🙂
Do I see a blog post about kelp in your future?
Yes!! I’m a marine bio major, it would be a shame if there wasn’t!
Kelp us, we can’t wait!
That pun is so bad it’s good!
Béla Tanner (all neopronouns) is an intern at Botanical Culture and a freshie at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Fae is currently majoring in Marine Biology and hoping to add Critical Race and Ethnic Studies as well as an Art major.
Jean Willoughby (she/her) is an herbalist and writer based in Florida.
