Chérie N. Rivers, Red Natural History Fellow
Chérie is a writer, teacher, and radical Black ecologist whose work stems from a commitment to interrupting modern colonialism with the transformative power of imagination. She is founder and co-director of Dandelions’, an educational biodynamic farm and earth-based school, and the author of award-winning books including To Be Nsala’s Daughter: Decomposing the Colonial Gaze (2023), Necessary Noise: Music, Film, and Charitable Imperialism in the East of Congo (2016), and the edited volume The Art of Emergency: Aesthetics and Aid in African Crises (2020). As a professor of Geography at UNC Chapel Hill, Chérie teaches courses on Liberation Geographies, Agroecology and Ecoliteracy, Freedom Farming, and Beyond Sustainability. She served for 12 years as Director of Education at Yole!Africa, an Indigenous-run cultural and educational center in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.