Kiara Sample

This dissertation investigates the epistemologies of contemporary herbalist, rootwork, and death keeper practices by Black femmes in the United States. The research develops a “Black femme eco-erotic framework” that re-conceptualizes the relationship between Black bodies, nature, queer femininity, and erotic consciousness. Approaching the medicinal and spiritual knowledge of plant matter as living archives of Black diasporic consciousness, the study documents how practitioners understand themselves as extensions of nature while recognizing landscapes as sites of both historical violence and possibility. The work explores the sensual intelligence of herbalism and rootwork practices as a creative and spiritual practice shaping diasporic Black queer subjectivities. Through ethnographic and archival methods, the project reveals how these Black femme herbal practitioners challenge capitalist property logics, create sustainable environmental ethics amid ecological crisis, and forge life-affirming possibilities through plant collaborations; it also offers alternative perspectives on Blackness, gender, sexuality, and nature.