In her powerful essay To Subsist, Sherene¯Seikaly weaves together vivid descriptions of landscapes, Indigenous lifeways, colonial violence, and ecological crisis to explore how subsistence offers not only survival strategies but also a path toward sustainable futures. She traces the seasonal rhythms of the Tulare Basin where oak, sycamore, marshes, grasses, and wildlife once thrived to reveal how Indigenous peoples, especially the Yokuts, lived in harmony with their surroundings. Seikaly argues that this practice of subsistence is more than a way to eat, it is a form of governance, knowledge, and resistance against dispossession. Her essay invites readers to rethink modern environmental and economic systems, suggesting that subsistence provides a moral lens through which we might reimagine our fractured relationship with land and water.
The Ecology of Subsistence
Seikaly begins with a lyrical account of the basin’s ecology: snowmelt from the Sierra Nevada fills the lake, supporting tule marshes, fish, turtles, elk, deer, and antelope. She writes:
It is Spring. The valley is a patchwork of ecologies Tule lines the lake’s marshes, where elk, deer, and antelope graze. Small turtles peak in and out of the water, mussels thrive
This rich portrayal illustrates how each season offers bounty and balance, underscoring the deep knowledge Indigenous communities cultivated to live with, rather than exploit, these ecosystems.
The Disruption of Colonial Imposition
Seikaly then traces the environmental and social devastation wrought by settlers, industrial agriculture, railroads, and mission systems. She details how rivers were diverted, oak forests girdled, grazing cattle depleted native grasses and how native lifeways were erased:
Before the gold mining. Before capitalists, bankers, and lawyers Before Anglo settlers dug ditches that sucked the water from the mountains
This passage highlights the steady unraveling of the basin’s ecological fabric and the violent imposition of modern colonial economies.
Redefining Subsistence
Central to Seikaly’s essay is a question: what does it mean to subsist in a world shaped by extraction and climate collapse? She critiques modernization theories that dismiss subsistence as irrational or backward. Instead, she suggests subsistence is a necessary practice of resistance:
To subsist today is a return of sorts A return to human and nonhuman ecologies layered with meaning to continue to exist, to stand firm.
By reclaiming subsistence, communities reconnect with cycles of life and reassert sovereignty over land, water, and resources.
Time, Inevitability, and Resistance
Seikaly challenges linear, progressive narratives that validate capitalist expansion. She urges us to recognize time as cyclical and ecological, where ancestral practices remain relevant. Her invocation of ghost lineages and ghost acres suggests that the past persists in the land, guiding future possibilities.
She writes: Ghosts are more than reminders of the past; they are powerful forces of the present, they are voices from the future.
This framing positions ancestral knowledge not as relic, but as a living guide in times of climate crisis and colonial unmaking.
Subsistence as Collective Survival
The essay invites us to expand our notion of subsistence beyond individual survival toward collective land-centered governance. Seikaly emphasizes the interdependence of human and nonhuman life and the ways in which sustainable practices emerge through reciprocity:
To see the living and the dead together moves us beyond haunting To return to the Tulare Basin is to imagine a kinship that extends beyond human domains.
From this view, subsistence becomes an ethic of care that holds ecosystems, generations, and species in a web of mutual responsibility.
Lessons for Today’s Crises
Seikaly’s essay resonates deeply in our current climate emergency. She draws connections between historical dispossession, ecological collapse, and modern crises. Subsistence emerges as both a remembrance and a blueprint an enactment of survival and transformation through rooted, ecological practices.
- Reconnecting with local ecologies to build resilience
- Compensating for loss through land restoration and seed saving
- Honoring Indigenous methodologies of stewardship in policy planning
- Building solidarity through shared subsistence economies
To Subsist by Sherene¯Seikaly is a compelling blend of historical reflection, ecological awareness, and decolonial theory. By foregrounding the Yokuts and Indigenous ontologies of land, water, and time, Seikaly challenges dominant narratives that treat subsistence as backward. Instead, she shows it as essential to confronting ongoing climate collapse and settler colonialism. Her essay urges us to reclaim subsistence not only as a mode of survival but as a political project of ecological belonging and intergenerational care. In a world unraveling under extractive logics, Seikaly offers subsistence as a radical, rooted answer.
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